The Year of the Black Rabbit
by Izaya Heiwajima
Summary: When a black rabbit with red eyes makes itself known to Shizuo, his apathetic life takes a turn for the interesting. A philosophical story about a connection among souls and selves throughout the worlds of existence.
1. Chapter 1

**Warning: Contains malexmale relations, explicit violence, sex, offensive language, and alternate characters and themes.**

**Disclaimer: **_**Durarara!**_** Is not a creation of my mind and neither are the characters of Heiwajima Shizuo, Orihara Izaya or any other character derived from **_**Durarara!**_

**Summary: **Shizuo lives his life from day to day but that is about to change when a black rabbit presents itself to him. Feeling an unexplainable urge, he decides to chase the rabbit and ends up in an alternate universe. In this universe, he learns of things he never thought he would ever come to experience. Alternate personalities are peeked in at through unrecalled dreams in an invisible connection that Shizuo has to his other selves.

**Author's Note: **I will admit right now: this story does not really have a direct plot or point. Things just happen. I didn't write it to lead into specific points or events. It is a philosophical narrative similar towards _Alice in Wonderland. _I wanted to leave this story very open-ended for interpretation so that it can be up to each individual reader to take away from it what they wish. Decipher it in your own perceptive and apply meaning where you find fit. I sincerely hope you enjoy my story.

Before you wonder**, the main characters of this story (Shizuo and Izaya, duh) are **_**alternative versions **_**of Shizuo and Izaya**. They are none of the official alternative versions but instead ones I simply made up. They aren't massively different from the original- it's actually more their _world _that's alternative than them as whole. So if they seem a little out of character, that's why. Hopefully they still seem like Shizuo and Izaya though to a degree!

**Character References: **There are a lot of alternative Shizaya pairings in this story. It can be assumed that every single time a dream sequence happens; the two men in the dream are (obviously) Shizuo and Izaya. Some are originals, but I've made a list of every single one that's considered an official character in some way- with pictures! I found all pictures on Zerochan/Tumblr and made absolutely none of them.

Just remove the spaces from the links and it should work. If not then..well..look it up on your own?

_Psyche & Tsugaru_ (Psychedelic vol. 1): http: /i51. tinypic. com/2j69rhg. jpg  
><em>Hibi &amp; Delic<em> (Psychedelic vol. 2): http: /i53. tinypic. com/16kcpjl. jpg  
><em>Tsukishima &amp; HachimenroppiRoppi_ (Drama CD): http: /i54. tinypic .com/244qpw4. png  
><em>Shitsuo &amp; Roppi<em> (fandom?/Drama CD): http: /i51. tinypic .com/25h2wyf. jpg  
><em>Demon Izaya and his Perfect Creation Shizuo<em> was inspired by this video- which I highly suggest watching both because it's beautiful and demon-Izaya makes a few appearances in my story so it'll be easier to envision him. (fandom): http: /www. youtube .com/watch?v = bo8meEqnLkY

**Book mentioned and used indirectly as reoccurring themes**

_Watership Down _by Richard Adams  
><em>Peter Pan <em>by J.M Barrie  
><em>Alice in Wonderland <em>by Lewis Carroll

Sorry for the long intro! This won't be in every upcoming chapter. Thank you!

**There are six parts to this story. It's already complete. It's now just a matter of putting it out!**

****Also, I would like to dedicate this story to my mother. I love you and thank you for your support.****

X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X

**The Year of the Black Rabbit**

The mundane is humanity's suffering in its purest form. A tedious schedule of routine events that plague one's life day after day. Wake up, shower, eat breakfast, go to work, come home, go to sleep. Rinse and repeat. Life was one giant shampoo bottle full of disappointments. The unexpected were the extraordinary but when did the unexpected become as listless as the next day?

Meaning, when did changing what you eat for lunch make you realize how pathetic your life has become?

These were the thoughts that consumed Heiwajima Shizuo. He expected nothing of life and in turn was granted just that. Absolutely nothing. The blond Japanese man might as well have been dead. His existence was trivial until he owed money, his emotions weren't pliable until he got upset at work, and his love life wasn't important until he was concluded to be a homosexual.

It was funny how the "little" things suddenly became "big" things when they weren't what people wanted them to be. It was funny how easily a human life could be ignored up until a mistake was made or a difference was declared. The day he was evicted from his first apartment had given Shizuo a flare of hope. It had made him believe that perhaps it was a sign that things were going to change.

It was four years later and nothing had changed except for relocation in living. His brother still visited him every now and then when he wasn't too busy making movies and he still had to re-bleach his hair every few months. He was a walking bombshell. The world deserved to be warned of his anger.

Although lately he felt as though his anger had dwindled down due to his own personal apathy. Even the thugs who followed him home some nights gave him nothing to be furious about. The strongest man in Ikebukuro had settled into the shadows and as far as the city was concerned, he might as well have died.

The city itself was rotting from the inside out just like Shizuo. Since when had he become so depressed? Was that really what it could even be considered? It wasn't as though he felt sad. Lonely perhaps, but not sad. As he trudged through the ally to find his way back home, he contemplated nothing other than what to watch once he got back to his apartment complex.

That's when something caught his eye. It was a cursory movement of black and red. When he looked, he saw nothing. Perhaps it was simply his mind playing tricks on him. He continued to walk yet again. The summer evening was boiling hot and he wouldn't be too shocked if he was hallucinating from it. There was a celebration tonight. He forgot what of. He stopped celebrating Japan's national holidays a long time ago.

As he climbed the steps up to his apartment, he saw the flash of movement again. This time when he turned to look, he caught the fleeting movement of something furry disappearing around the corner of his building. He didn't know what made him chase after it, but he felt a sudden wave of spontaneity. So Shizuo ran.

When he turned the corner, he saw it as clear as day. It was a large, solid black rabbit. It was practically the size of an average dog. When it looked at Shizuo, he was taken aback by two glowing red eyes. They taunted him before the rabbit dashed away again. Did it want him to follow?

The rabbit didn't have a choice now: Shizuo was invested.

So he chased after the rabbit. And what a chase it was. Ally after ally they passed through. The rabbit would stop every now and then and look back at him. It was these actions that made Shizuo quickly realize that the creature _wanted _him to follow. The rabbit ducked into an old, destroyed building looked like it may have been temple once upon a time.

There was caution tape across the front doors but Shizuo ripped it away carelessly. People did dangerous things every day in this city. It would be no difference to him, a man who could feel no pain, whether or not he partook in illegal things as well.

He ripped open the door and tossed it aside like it was a piece of scrap paper. Inside the building, there was a distinct moldy scent of rotting wood. The paint on the walls had peeled off long ago, revealing termite-destroyed wood. Holes the size of his fists gapped here and there. This building was ready to cave any moment but that wasn't what Shizuo was concerned about.

Where had that rabbit gone?

He kicked down a door to a separate room and stepped inside. The dust was so thick that Shizuo began to cough almost instantly. When the air cleared, he could see a pair of red eyes staring back at him but nothing else.

"What do you want?" Shizuo grunted. Somehow, the red eyes moved up and up. As though the rabbit was suddenly floating.

But then…A man stepped out of the shadows.

His face was delicately handsome, cropped in by black hair and complete with an easy smile.

"Hey."

The voice was startlingly bright and light-hearted, as if the man knew nothing but joy and optimism.

"Who are you?"

"Does it matter?"

It didn't really but the answer irritated Shizuo nonetheless. The man in question lifted the hood of the fur-lined parka he was wearing and it instantly shadowed all of his face but for his two red glowing eyes.

"Follow me."

"Why should I?"

"Because that's what you're _supposed _to do. You followed me up til just now, didn't you?"

The rabbit, or rather the man, was right.

When he turned around and started to walk, Shizuo didn't hesitate to follow. He blindly tried to search through the darkness for something to grab onto. Anything to steady his unsure steps. The television schedule was no longer on his mind.

Shizuo suddenly tripped. When he fell, it felt as though he had landed into something murky and damp. He lifted a hand and put it close to his face. A grueling smell of fresh tar met his nose and he instantly started to struggle. However, the tar was much stronger than Shizuo and began to swallow his body like quick sand.

Shizuo was too panicked to scream. Instead, he began to try and wrench his limbs free of the sticky substance. It only worsened the effects. When the tar was up to his chin, he knew that it was all over. There would be no way that he could escape this now- not even if someone were to come along. It didn't make his body still any further, despite its exhaust from the struggle.

When the tar began to fill his mouth, he started spluttering. The black substance bit at his throat and made his eyes water. It was suffocation in the worst possible way. The last thing Shizuo saw was a pair of red eyes.

X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X

"Does the jury find this man guilty of first degree murder?"

"Yes, your honor."

The crowd gathered in the court room began to cheer. Shizuo blinked.

"Wait, what?"

He was suddenly being handcuffed. Wait, _what _was happening? Where the hell was he? And who did this asshole think he was putting Shizuo in handcuffs?

"Get off of me!" Shizuo yelled, already reaching for the police officer's shirt. He broke apart the handcuffs with ease and grabbed the officer by the front of the shirt. The crowd gasped in fear as he whipped the man through the air and into the nearest wall. His head met it with a sickening crunch and blood popped out of the back of his skull like juice from a cherry. The body fell down with a thud and the court was silenced.

"Shoot him!" someone yelled and Shizuo looked around frantically but it was too late. Gunshots scorched his body and he collapsed, throwing his arms over his head. He had been shot in several times. He could feel the sensation of the bullets. Blood bubbled from his mouth and he spat it up onto the ground. Fuck, fuck, fuck, _fuck. _

"I'm _innocent!"_he screamed over the gunshots, which only seemed to further aggravate the cops. He struggled to stand up and looked into the crowd.

Just like that…everything stood still. The man from before was in the very middle of the crowd. He was watching Shizuo with a serene expression upon his face.

"Would you like to learn how to fly?" the man asked.

Before Shizuo could answer, everything sped up yet again and the gunshots continued. He charged through the aisle of the court room, desperately trying to flee the scene. When he burst out of the front doors, he toppled down the concrete steps and finally landed in a heap at the very bottom.

He rolled over onto his back and was met with a horrifying sight.

The city of Tokyo was destroyed.

The sky was an angry, brilliant red, poisoned from pollution long ago. The buildings of the once grand city were rotten yet the advertisements were still running, only with scratchy quality. Gunshots could be heard in the far distance along with the wails of police sirens.

The stone statues of lions on either side of the entrance to the court yard no longer had their heads. Graffiti crawled over the bases at their great paws and Shizuo felt the sudden urge to be sick.

"You need to _stand _now, Shizu-chan."

Shizuo's head snapped to the side and there stood the man. His eyes were not glowing as intently this time but rather looked natural. Or as natural as red eyes _could _look. The man bent down and offered his hand to Shizuo. What choice did he have? He grabbed the hand and heaved himself up.

Due to blood loss, he was beginning to feel faint and the man must've sensed that because he slipped an arm behind Shizuo and helped him start to walk. It didn't take long before they broke into a frantic run, hearing the crowd from the court house start to come out.

"They'll be thirsty for blood!" the man said gleefully. Shizuo wasn't sure if he really liked this guy or not. But he was helping him and the least Shizuo could do was not pass judgment so soon.

"You're leaving a trail," the man suddenly said and when Shizuo looked over his shoulder, he indeed saw a few specks of blood following after them.

They came to a stop and the man began to look this way and that.

"That's no good, hn."

"Who _are _you?"

"Stop asking such stupid questions, okay? It doesn't matter!"

The man didn't sound impatient. He sounded like he was mocking Shizuo for _not understanding. _What did this guy expect?

"Do they really think I murdered someone?"

"Of course. It's because you did."

"I think you have me mistaken for someone.."

"Nope. Heiwajima Shizuo. Age twenty three. Citizenship number 00331."

"…Citizenship number?"

"Yes."

What the hell was that?

"Stop acting so stupid, Shizu-chan. Did you hit your head?" the man asked and reached out for Shizuo's sleeve. With ease, he ripped it open and rolled the material up. Much to Shizuo's shock, a neat, black tattoo was placed along the inside of his wrist. It read his citizenship number.

"I..I don't.."

"Shizu-chan, come on."

Right. They were running from an angry mob. The man removed his parka and gave it to Shizuo.

"It should fit you perfectly. Zip it up. It'll help stop the blood from dripping behind you."

Shizuo did as he was told and soon the two men were running again. Shizuo hated to admit it, but it was probably a good thing that he had only been shot in his torso. As they ran, the sound of the mob seemed to become a distant noise.

"Where are we going?"

"Does it matter?"

Why did that sound so familiar?

They eventually reached a building that looked half destroyed. Almost as demolished as the temple that Shizuo had originally entered. Only this time, he wasn't following a damn rabbit.

They headed around the back of the building and the man eventually approached a low window that was smashed in. He gestured for Shizuo to get inside.

"There isn't any tar in there…is there?"

"No, why would there be?"

"Never mind."

Shizuo crawled onto his knees and started to force himself through the window feet first. When he fell down, he landed on his feet and instantly stumbled backwards from the window. Not a second later, the man slipped in gracefully behind him. The man quickly moved to the window and slid a plank of metal over it.

The room they were in was lit by flickering candles. It wasn't until Shizuo turned around that he realized that they were not alone.

There were three kids huddled together on a dirty mattress. Each were dressed in a blue school uniform, but each was equally as filthy and beaten up as the next. Even the girl looked roughed up a bit.

On the other side of the room was a man in a white lab coat, only the coat was a bit blood drenched. His face was distinctly young but there was something about his exhausted eyes that made him appear far older than he probably was. On the table in front of him was a white cloth covering what appeared to be a body. Shizuo didn't want to know whether or not that body was dead or alive.

"Izaya-kun, you're back." One of the kids from the group stood up abruptly. He had blond hair and wide, naïve amber eyes that glowed positively as he ran towards the man that had lead Shizuo here.

Izaya.

"And you brought Heiwajima-san," the girl spoke up quietly from behind the blond boy. She had stood up as well, adjusted her glasses, and approached them.

Shizuo felt so utterly confused. He had never even met these kids and they were acting as though they knew him and had been expecting him for some time now.

Izaya had wrapped his arms around the blond boy loosely, but his attention was yet again on Shizuo.

"He doesn't remember."

"Are you serious?" Now it was the man in the lab coat's turn to speak. He turned away from the table and stormed over to where the small group was standing. He looked distressed about the information.

"But you had programmed him specifically to-."

"I understand what I had done but it failed, Shinra." Izaya sounded unimpressed.

Shinra stared at Shizuo and looked so pathetic that Shizuo almost felt guilty. Until he remembered that he didn't know who any of these people even were.

"Can I get a role call or something…?" Shizuo asked after a moment of hesitation.

"Right, guys- introduce yourself."

"But…"

"He doesn't _remember _and there is nothing we can do about that for now. Introduce yourselves."

"You can just call me...Kida," the blond boy said, his voice unsure as he stared around Izaya and at Shizuo. Shizuo tilted his head in acknowledgement but was still unsure as to why everyone was so confused. Didn't remember? He remembered perfectly well. He had been going back home when he had decided to chase that stupid rabbit.

"Sonohara Anri, Heiwajima-san," the girl spoke and bowed respectfully to him. She fixed her glasses upon straightening up and peered anxiously over at the third boy on the mattress. By then, he had stood up as well. He looked as anxious as the doctor, especially as he walked over near everyone else.

"I'm Mikado," he said. He stared at Shizuo. Like he had betrayed them or something. Were they insane?

"I'm Shinra. And you're bleeding all over. Come with me." Shinra grabbed his arm suddenly and Shizuo didn't have much of a choice but to stumble after him. He looked over his shoulder at the group and the only one watching him was Izaya. Those observant red eyes made him feel uneasy.

They passed by the table with the body on it, and only then did Shizuo realize it had no head. Where the blanket should have rested over a lump of skull, it only lay flat against the surface of the table. Shizuo quickly looked away, his stomach churning at the thought of what the body must look like under the sheet.

He was lead to a vacant medical table and asked to sit down. He complied and the amateur doctor removed Izaya's jacket then began to clip his ruined clothes off. His bullet-ridden torso was revealed, a total of ten bullets having made it into his body.

"Do you feel anything?" Shinra asked as he carefully touched his finger to one of the wounds.

"No."

"Good. Then you haven't changed completely."

"What the hell do you mean?"

Shinra looked up at him in surprise. He adjusted his own glasses and smiled after a moment. The smile was unsure but more steady than any of the prior looks he had been giving Shizuo.

"Have you ever wondered why you had such impossible strength, Shizuo?"

"How did you know about that?"

Shinra only grinned, looking reassured of something. He got to work quickly. He had to take out each bullet. Luckily, none of them had gotten too far. Shizuo's skin grew irritated with all of the fussing but otherwise, Shizuo only felt sensations.

He watched the others while he was operated on. During the duration of time spent on the slab, he watched Anri and Mikado leave the room. Kida and Izaya sat down at a wooden table and began to discuss something of importance. Or at least Shizuo concluded as much from the intense expression on the kid's face. The man, on the other hand, never lost his composure. Not once.

"Do you even remember Izaya-kun?"

The voice startled him out of his thoughts and Shizuo looked at Shinra.

"The fuck? No! God damn it, don't you get it? I don't remember _any of you. _Because I've never _met _any of you!" Shizuo yelled, his temper already boiling. And just like that, Izaya was there.

"Shinra."

That was all it took for the doctor to leave.

Izaya smiled easily and picked up a cotton square. He dabbed it into a small bowl of disinfectant alcohol and began to rub it around Shizuo's fresh stitches to clean up the wounds of blood and bacteria.

"Don't get mad with him. He doesn't understand that you have no recollection. Before you argue, you have to face the truth. You clearly existed within our world. Even if you don't remember. Please try to be gentler with my friends."

Despite the gentle nature of his voice, Shizuo felt something from the other man that had him wary and on edge. He didn't trust him.

"Kay, fine, but you gotta answer some of my questions, got it? I can play all nice and shit but I want some answers."

"Fair."

"Okay…Firstly, who the hell are you?"

"Orihara Izaya. It is nice to meet you." He chuckled as though he had just made some brilliant joke. What an asshole.

"Now you tell me…"

"I didn't want to at first."

"Why not?"

"It would ruin the moment~."

Shizuo wanted to slug that smirk right off Izaya's face. What kind of answer was that?

Instead, he chose to continue with his interrogation.

"Where are we?"

"Tokyo."

This wasn't the Tokyo he recalled.

"What the hell happened to it?"

Izaya's movements hesitated but then continued as if nothing had happened whatsoever.

"War."

War? Since when had there been a war in Tokyo? The man before him seemed almost as though he felt amused by the concept of Tokyo in war.

"Who are we at war with?"

"Ourselves."

The answer unsettled Shizuo's stomach. He didn't like it one bit. He decided that he was done asking questions for now. Even though he was still curious as to why the hell that crowd had thought he had murdered someone. Sure, he got into plenty of fights, but murder? Shizuo was a good man, deep down, and he would never be able to be heartless or violent enough to do that.

Or could he?

Suddenly, everything was susceptible to doubt. Even his own existence.

"I want you to rest. You lost a lot of blood. Come here."

Izaya took his arm in both of his hands and helped Shizuo off the table. Shizuo was ready to argue but when the room started spinning and his vision blurred, he knew that the man was right. He felt dizzy. He was lead over to another mattress that was swathed in black blankets. It looked so comfortable.

"Take your shoes off please." But Shizuo couldn't help but fall onto the mattress. The last thing he remembered was Izaya kneeling down to take his shoes off.

X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X

"_He will be complete. And he will be absolute in perfection."_

_The tube floating before the demon rotated on an invisible axis. It had heard him._

_The shadow of a demon approached the tube and placed his hand over the circular window on the very front. He peered in and saw the pristine nothingness of human existence. _

"_Perfect."_


	2. Chapter 2

**Disclaimer: Durarara! is not mine. Heiwajima Shizuo and Orihara Izaya were not my original creations.**

**Warning: Story contains violence, sexuality, offensive language, and malexmale relationships.**

X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X

When Shizuo awoke, it was night time. Or so he felt. The entire room was pitch black and silent except for the distant sounds of what he figured was..war. Tokyo at war. He still could not wrap his mind around that very concept. It haunted him.

He shifted on the mattress and his arm instantly hit something. A body. He turned his head. Beside him was Izaya. He was dressed down in a gray sweater, his lower body hidden among the blankets. His body was curled towards Shizuo's and his eyes were shut with sleep. Or so Shizuo thought.

They suddenly opened, glowing red.

"Shizu-chan." The whisper sent chills down Shizuo's spine. The man….No, the _creature _moved like a snake through the sheets. Shizuo couldn't comprehend how a man could move so inhumanly fast but before he knew it, Izaya had straddled his hips and leered down at him from his new position.

"Shizu-chan."

The repeat of his name was paired with a rather wanton expression. Shizuo could feel blood rush to his face. This was not happening.

"I...I…"

"What flavor do you want your tears to be?"

Before Shizuo could speak, Izaya had pushed his fingers to his mouth. Izaya grew a smirk across his face that brightened those red eyes and Shizuo stiffened in horror. There was something maddening about that smirk, something inhumanely cruel and vicious. Like a wild animal infected with rabies. Like all of human evil incarnate. This was the devil's sinister smile.

Izaya pushed two of his fingers into Shizuo's mouth, making Shizuo instantly drool at the flavor of salt on Izaya's fingers. Izaya pushed his fingers relentlessly into the back of Shizuo's throat.

"I've always wondered if monsters had gag reflexes."

Shizuo's eyes widened as Izaya persisted his fingers, shoving them literally _down _his throat and against his esophagus. While Shizuo did not gag, he struggled under Izaya's body and grasped his wrist with one hand. He began to squeeze.

Any normal human wouldn't have been able to tolerate Shizuo's inhuman strength. But Izaya started to laugh. It wasn't just a laugh though, it was maniacal and senseless. Wild and unpredictable like that smirk. Mirthful, he twisted his fingers and Shizuo's hand squeezed harder as his eyes water.

"Destruction is futile."

Izaya separated his fingers and Shizuo began to writhe under him in discomfort. It didn't hurt but the stress against the muscle was enough to make Shizuo want to escape the unnatural intrusion as soon as possible.

Then just like that, Izaya removed his fingers. He raised his fingers into the air and separated them entirely. Spit strung between them, glossed over the flesh and Izaya seemed to marvel over that.

"Would you like to fuck me, Shizu-chan?"

"_What?_"

"I said, would you like to fuck-."

"I _heard _you, I just can't _believe _you."

"Why not?"

"Who asks someone that question so nonchalantly? I've only just met you!"

Izaya looked down at him, and that smirk settled into something more of a humane, kind smile. Izaya looked down on Shizuo with a pitying expression.

"That's right. You don't remember."

"Remember _what?_"

Izaya removed himself from Shizuo's body and lay beside him. He stuck the wet fingers into his own mouth and casually suckled on them. Like it was a lollipop or something. Shizuo just found it disgusting. Izaya remained on his back and stared indifferently at the ceiling.

"You would fuck me a lot."

"Excuse me?"

"Do I have to repeat everything I say, Shizu-chan? Stop asking such tedious questions. You can obviously hear me."

Izaya didn't sound impatient. No, there was no particular emotion distinguishable in his voice. He popped his fingers out of his mouth and wiped them off on his sweater. That's when he looked back at Shizuo. His eyes were no longer glowing so fiercely and he looked…almost sweet.

"Except for when the climax of the war was happening, we slept together pretty often. Didn't you wonder why you woke up and I was here?"

Shizuo blinked. He hadn't thought twice about that. It had felt natural.

Oh.

"Did – were we lovers?"

"Lovers?" Izaya echoed, sincere confusion written across his face.

"Yes. Lovers. Like, were we in love?"

Further confusion was his only answer. Shizuo raised a brow. Did this kid not understand…? Then all of a sudden, Izaya covered his mouth and began to laugh.

"Oh, _oh. _I haven't heard that in such a long time. I almost completely forgot about that."

"Forgot about _what?_"

"Love!"

"How can you forget about love?"

Now, Izaya looked at him and finally held an expression of mild impatience.

"Shizu-chan, you're not five years old. This is immature of you."

"What is immature?" Shizuo's voice began to rise.

"Talking about love! Do you know how ridiculous you sound?"

It was Shizuo's turn to look confused. Realization seemed to dawn on Izaya because the man sighed heavily and sat up.

"Right. Memory. A decade or two ago, love was outdated and considered to be a malfunction of the brain. A release of unnecessary chemicals that only served as an error in the human focus of comprehension. Love was obliterated and replaced with more functional emotions that would ensure the human race in the long run rather than run it into the ground."

Shizuo had to stare. No really, he gawked at Izaya. Izaya sighed yet again.

"Love is just something used to enhance pornographic novels and children's stories."

_What?_

"You mean love..."

"Love is irrelevant in this world."

From the expression on Izaya's face, Shizuo knew that he was not lying. But Shizuo had to wonder, how could a society abolish love from existence? Surely people still _felt _it. Or did they just push it down to conform with the rest of everyone else?

"You can't just exterminate love though. Love is the most important component to any successful -."

"Shizu-chan," Izaya interrupted with a grave stare, "You really should stop talking like that."

"But don't you ever..."

"No."

Izaya smirked. It was cold.

"Don't be so foolish Shizu-chan. You hated me."

Hate? But then why…

Shizuo was left, yet again, filled with confusion. Izaya lay back down.

He could understand why he hated Izaya. He could see the qualities that would grind on his nerves. What he was confused about was if that was so, then why had they slept together? Frequently at that. As far as Shizuo was concerned, he had never even experienced his first kiss. But this guy was exclaiming that they had fucked. _Numerous _times.

"Hey, Izaya?"

"Hm?"

"Have we kissed?"

His response was a cruel laugh.

"At least you're still a complete idiot."

"The hell?"

"Shut up and go back to bed, Shizu-chan."

"No wonder I hated you.."

He was met with bright red eyes.

"Some things will never change."

X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X

_Rain splattered against the windows of the school building. The clock on the wall read an hour past when school was originally let out. Detention was still in session and had another twenty minutes left. Only two boys were in the room. A familiar blond and his brunette counterpart. _

_Shizuo had his head rested on the desk and tucked into his folded arms. Presumably asleep. Izaya sat a few desks behind him and had his attention focused on something outside._

_Izaya had a bandage on his cheek and a dark circle below one eye. Despite this, he looked satisfied with himself._

_Shizuo, on the other hand, was scratched up all over and his jacket was ruined. His mother would kill him but there was nothing that could be done. He felt empty today. That's why it had been so much easier for Izaya to provoke him. More so than usual._

"_Have you ever heard of the multiverse?"_

"_Shut it, flea."_

_Izaya didn't._

"_It's the theory that there are multiple universes that, in a certain respect, reflect one another. Like right now, on another world imaging our own, there are alternative versions of you and I. We could be lovers!"_

"_Don't make me puke."_

_Izaya snickered, but didn't continue his speech. At least, he didn't think he would until Shizuo spoke up._

"…_Where were you going with that anyway?"_

"_Ah, Shizu-chan wants to know?"_

"_I asked, didn't I?"_

_Izaya shrugged in response before he stood up. He walked over to where Shizuo was sitting and took a seat on the edge of his desk. Much to Shizuo's disdain._

"_Alternate universes."_

"_So what?"_

"_What do you think of time, Shizu-chan? Is it a river or is it a lake?"_

"_Eh?"_

_Izaya sighed but didn't give up. He knew that Shizuo could be a moron, but he also knew that deep down, Shizuo was the smartest person he knew._

"_Time. Some theorize that it's like a river- forever flowing in one direction and one direction only. You can't go back, you can only go forward. The end result being the ocean, or rather, death. A finite existence. But some theorize that time is like a lake. Collected in one infinite existence. That one has the freedom to move back and forth in time, or side to side- in respect to alternate universes. That everything merges together in one way or another. Do you follow?"_

"_Sure. I think."_

"_I personally believe that we are a part of the infinite existence of a time lake."_

"_So?"_

"_So, I'm just trying to make conversation!"_

"_Why?"_

"_Because I like Shizu-chan."_

X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X

When Shizuo woke yet again, it was day time. It must have been later in the day because the room that he had come into last night was void of everyone. Everyone, that is, except for the body on the table. Did they plan on getting rid of it anytime soon or were they just going to let it rot?

He slowly sat up in the bed and grimaced. He felt sore. At some point, someone must've wrapped bandages and gauze around his body to help avoid getting his stitches caught on anything. Next to him was a set of clothes identical to the ones he typically wore.

After Shizuo managed to get changed into the fresh clothes, he wasn't entirely sure what to do with himself. No note had been left and from what he could see, there was no food. There was a cooler full of water though and he helped himself to a water bottle.

There wasn't much to look at in the room. Wallpaper had peeled off mostly to reveal white cement on the walls. The cement had been decorated though with flaking paint. Blue butterflies. There were only blue butterflies. Had the girl he met before done that? She didn't seem like the type. None of them had. Maybe the paint was there before they had found the place. It looked old enough.

There were four mattresses. One in which he had shared with Izaya the previous night. Each had a bundle of blankets and quilts. Now that he was awake and comprehending his atmosphere, he realized how cool it was in the room. A couch was shoved into a corner with a television set in front of it. When Shizuo tried to turn it on, he only got static- even after fiddling with the wires sticking out of the top. His mother had once told him that those wires were called rabbit ears. He gave one of the wires a yank and snorted. _Of course._

He wanted to avoid the body for as long as possible but finally he couldn't resist curiosity. He walked over to the body and just stood there for a moment. Did he just lift the sheet or what? Suddenly, he felt overwhelmed. What if it was a horribly mutilated figure?

Well, there was nothing to lose. He lifted the blanket and…Was surprised.

Under the blanket was a woman. She was covered modestly in a black nightgown that reached her knees. What stunned him the most though was the cut-off section of the neck. There was no stub of a spine or scene of gore. Instead, there was just..flowing black smoke. It was then that Shizuo realized that this woman was not dead. Her chest was rising up and down. It was very miniscule but there was a definite movement.

"How_ dare _you touch Celty!" screamed a voice suddenly, startling Shizuo at once and making him drop the blanket back over the sleeping, _headless _woman.

Shinra, the doctor from the evening before, stomped over to him. Only this time his face was full of wrath and rage. Genuine hatred burned his eyes and his defensive system was on overdrive.

"I-."

"You sick freak! What were you trying to do?" Shinra yelled, his voice already hoarse.

That's when Izaya came in. He was so quick that even Shizuo hadn't seen him come into the room. He was behind Shinra and holding a flick blade to his neck. There was fierceness to him that Shizuo hadn't seen before. He mentally reprimanded himself for that statement. _You've only known him for a day! Not even!_

"Don't you insinuate that Shizu-chan would do something as filthy as sleep with Celty. Don't insult me like that, Shinra. I thought you were smarter than that," Izaya snarled lowly. While Shizuo _hadn't _known Izaya for long, it didn't take a close friend to recognize that this was completely uncharacteristic of the man to react so aggressively.

Shinra's rage wilted and guilt filled his expression instead.

"I'm sorry, Izaya-kun."

"Tch. Don't apologize to me." And just like that, Izaya was calm and carefree again, the flick blade out of sight, and out of mind.

Shinra turned guilty eyes onto Shizuo, but he couldn't look directly at him.

"I am sorry, Shizu-kun. I just..I just.."

"It's fine, whatever. I wasn't trying anything. I was just wondering why you had a dead body lying around."

"Oh..Well I guess I should have explained, huh? She's not dead by the way. She's asleep."

Shizuo put his hands up. As far as he was concerned, he didn't need to know much more about the headless woman.

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The city looked as though it were endless. It was so black though. Like the poison from the war and death itself had sunk into the city's veins and tainted it in an irreversible way.

"I haven't seen the stars in so long," Izaya said quietly, sitting besides Shizuo on a supporting railing that was lined around the top of a sky scraper. Izaya had told Shizuo that it was to try and keep people safe but that this particular sky scraper was popular for suicides.

Irony was wonderful.

"We used to come here a lot when we were younger," Izaya explained, a fond expression on his face. Shizuo had to wonder if that thing about love was true.

"Really?"

"I don't remember."

"But you just said…"

"I know. But.." Izaya looked down and over the edge of the building. It was a long drop. Shizuo could understand why people would commit suicide from the building.

"Sometimes I get images. They're from other universes."

"What?"

"Shizu-chan."

Izaya suddenly looked at him. There was avid fear in his expression and Shizuo wanted nothing more than to touch and comfort him. He resisted. Where did that even come from?

"You have no idea how much I've missed you."

Shizuo looked away. The conversation was intimate and he wanted no part in that when he couldn't even remember Izaya properly.

"You've always been the king."

Shizuo looked up and stared at Izaya. His expression was void yet he looked so somber. He stared out over the city.

"I had everything calculated and planned to a complete and perfect tee. You were the white king. And I was the black king. We were to fight one another at the very end and the world would crumble how it had to crumble when that time came. Because no matter how you look at a chess board, it's always the kings that matters most. And Celty, she had been the queen."

As far as Shizuo was concerned, Izaya might as well have been speaking Russian.

"Izaya?"

"Hn?"

"Are you human?"

Izaya looked over at Shizuo with his calm expression. When he smiled, his eyes grew deviant.

"Sometimes, I wonder that myself."

Shizuo was reduced to silence.

"And then I have to wonder, _are you?_"

Shizuo looked away from Izaya and felt a curling, sickening sensation in the gut of his stomach. All of his life, he had been ridiculed and hated for his strength and temper. The children at school avoided him in fear of getting hurt. Bullies would target him in hopes of gaining the title of defeating Shizuo. Teachers didn't want to talk to him. Eventually, Shizuo had given up. He had accepted that he was a monster.

So, he had withdrawn himself. He kept so far out of society's reach that he practically deleted his existence like one might delete a file from a computer.

"You mentioned other universes," Shizuo said.

"Yes."

"What about them?"

"Have you ever heard of a multiverse?"

The question, for some reason, sounded so familiar. Shizuo tried to think back. Had he? It sounded familiar.

"Like an alternate universe or something?"

"Yes. They're basically the same thing. Might as well be anyway. This society of ours had developed in the field of science beyond original perceived possibility. We discovered things that we probably should have never, ever been allowed to discover. It is what lead us to this world."

Izaya gestured to Tokyo.

"This isn't just Tokyo. Every city in the world is dying. All because we had unlocked the doors between the universes."

Something about that sounded bad. _Really _bad. Shizuo wasn't sure if he wanted to hear more, but there was a voice in the back of his head saying that he needed to hear more. That it was essential.

"We began to play around in the other universes. It started out with professional, honest people who wanted to study the concept of multiversity. We just wanted to understand.."

"You keep saying we."

"Ah, yes. Shinra, myself, and a team of select scientists were invested in the project from the start. To be honest, it's our fault everything is like this. We wanted to know more so we dug deeper. We experimented harder and were careless."

Shizuo stared at Izaya now. Izaya did not look guilty despite his words but rather exhausted. He slid off the railing and stood on the sliver of concrete that separated him from death. He held onto the railing and hung himself over the edge.

"Hey- be careful."

"Don't worry so much."

Shizuo was reduced to silence and instead prepared himself to move if necessary.

"Where do I come into play?" asked Shizuo.

Izaya looked up suddenly, his eyes wide. He looked down yet again and shook his head.

"I don't know if I can really explain that to you just yet, Shizu-chan. You were.."

Shizuo looked at him expectantly.

"You were created for me."


	3. Chapter 3

Disclaimer: Durarara! is not mine. Heiwajima Shizuo and Orihara Izaya were not my original creations.

Warning: Story contains violence, sexuality, offensive language, and malexmale relationships.

Thank you so much for your reviews. They really inspire me to keep on writing when I know I have people who appreciate what I do. :]

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_The tube spun slowly. It was ready._

_The demon lurking in the room finally unlocked the switch and the tube split down the middle vertically. White smoke emitted from the tube, filling the already stark room. The humidity told the demon that his creation had worked. Out stepped a blank, white shape of a human. A tall male with a mess of hair. He looked sad, despite not yet having a face._

"_Perfect. You are absolutely perfect."_

_The demon beckoned to the figure and the man walked towards him. The demon gestured for him to sit onto a stool and instantly sat down in front of him._

"_Let's see, let's see! What to do with you. Well you clearly took a human shape. A male- that I didn't fully expect but..You are beautiful and that I cannot deny. Then again, gender is irrelevant, isn't it?"_

_The man did not respond._

_Why did he look so sad?_

_Why did he look so sad without a face? _

"_I've given you two arms to hug with and two legs to kick with. I've given you hands to pick up things and I've given you feet to walk on. What else do you want? How about ears?"_

_The demon conjured a pair of ears. They looked good against the side of the man's head. They fit into the blank, white outline of a man well._

"_Let's see..Ah! Of course. A nose." And just like that, a nose was created._

"_For you to sniff out your enemies with-." The demon teased._

_The demon leaned forward further more and tapped his finger onto the man's forehead._

"_Let's give you a brain to think with. I will make you the most brilliant creature alive."_

_And with that, the demon presented the man with the most brilliant brain of all time._

_A brain with the comprehension of simplicity. A brain with the incapacity to see the complex._

_It was perfection. Blue would always remain blue to this man and the sky would just be the sky and never a possibility of heaven. Unless, of course, he was asked to perceive it with such a notion._

"_With every brain comes a few troubles though and yours, so simple, will come with its own in due time."_

_The man didn't reply. Of course, he couldn't reply. The demon had yet to give him the ability. _

_The demon took his finger and placed it directly to where the man's mouth should be. Or so the demon felt. He slid his finger slowly across the man's face, and after it, a black line was drawn. He removed his finger and after that, a dark mouth formed._

"_To kiss _one _person with," the man said in a deep, rumbling voice._

_The demon smirked. This man was perfection at its finest._

"_Exactly," the demon replied._

_He understood very well. The demon sat up straight and began to circulate his hands together and it didn't take long for two orbs to form. _

"_To see the ignorance in the world. And to understand the beauty."_

_He placed the eyes into the face of the man. The man stared listlessly at him. But with realization of sight, his eyes began to grow golden with the enlightenment of vision._

_The man would see everything. _

"_Why do you look so sad?" the demon asked his creation. He placed his palm flat atop of the man's head, coloring his hair a dark brown. He removed his hand and looked satisfied- even though the demon too did not have a face. Only a wide, white smirking mouth._

_The man did not reply at first. Instead, he stared into the blackness of the demon's figure before him._

"_I feel so weak."_

"_Yes. I would imagine. I have been creating you for a very long time now."_

"_May I ask for a favor?"_

_The demon was surprised. He had created many a thing before but never before had they requested anything. They had all been far too young to understand the idea of opinion and want. Then again, this man had been created to _be perfect. _The demon didn't know why he felt surprised._

"_Of course. But there may be a consequence" _

"_I want to be strong."_

"_Eh?"_

"_Let me be strong so I can protect those that I love. Please! I cannot lose in front of someone who loves me!"_

_The demon was taken aback by the man's devoted passion. Then the demon smiled._

"_Of course. But for such strength, you'll have a price to pay."_

"_Anything."_

"_Are you sure about that?"_

"_Yes."_

"_But you haven't even heard what it will be."_

"_You're my creator. You couldn't be that cruel.."_

_The demon smirked._

"_If you insist then. Do you see me?"_

"_Yes."_

"_Then you know that I am void of existence."_

"_But I see you in existence as we speak."_

"_Ah, in terms of existence, I am not created. Do you know why?"_

_The man shook his head._

"_I am but a demon. We do not have the same rights to exist as angels. Therefor, we exist as this blackness. But to the world of otherwise, we might as well not exist at all. It is our creations that represent our existence for us. And I have been trying forever to create the perfect existence. Every living thing has a reflection, even if they must make it themselves. I may not exist, but I am alive."_

_The man remained silent. The demon reached forward and placed his hand over the man's chest._

"_You were created for me. You have given me the fundamental quality of existence."_

"_And what is that?"_

_The demon pushed his hand into the man's chest slowly. When he retracted his hand, he had the man's heart tightly within his grasp._

"_Love. You see, you cannot _force_ a soul mate. You can only hope and pray for one. Yes, I created you, but the creation of your soul to fit mine was something I could have only hoped for. The soul takes its own form on its own time. Every creation develops self-sufficiently. The soul itself has nothing to do with the creator- nor does the connections it makes Even the creators of creatures still aren't sure as to how a soul comes to be. We only know that it exists. I had to wait for our souls to naturally connect- and that might have never happened. I could have waited millions of years for your soul to connect to mine."_

"_Millions…of years? Just like that?"_

"_Yes. You're worth the pain of patience." The demon smirked._

_The heart separated into two, one part of the heart melting back into the man but the other half resided in the demon's clutches. The demon pulled his hand back to his own chest and rested the heart right there._

_The man was rigid and stared in despair at his other half._

_The demon rose the heart to his dark mouth and opened up. The first bite was delicious, the second bite more so. When he ate the heart, the man across from him trembled. _

"_This is the last time you will ever feel physical pain," the demon said after the last bite of the heart._

"_I will keep it safe forever," the demon promised, his hand over his own chest. The sensation of a beating heart was something that he would have to get used to. But it worked. He felt inexplicably drawn towards the man in front of him. _

"_We are connected," the man said in awe._

"_Eternally and completely. Your soul developed naturally to be the harmonized reflection of my own. If it wasn't…Well, this wouldn't have worked." The demon gestured between them and at their shared heart._

"_Will you leave me?"_

"_Never. It might take a while for me to find you but I will always find you. Every soul has a pure form. This..well this is mine. However, yours has yet to be constructed. You haven't been in existence enough for that. It's after all of the selves and all of the connections have come together as one. We can't yet co-exist within our actual consciousness. We can only exist together within our subconscious. I will live with you for a hundred thousand years without even knowing it. But I _will _find you."_

_The man stared down at his hands. The demon reached his hand to the man's face and lifted his face._

"_Your strength will be your greatest enemy and best friend. Learn to harness it and that choice is yours."_

_The man stared at the demon, at his creator, at his soul mate with growing passion._

"_You will know the pain of existence unlike any other human. You will understand the passion of hate and love. You will understand the rejection of society and what it truly is to be lonely. What flavor do you want your tears to be? Salty? Sweet? Sour?"_

_When the man didn't respond, the demon brought his finger below one of his eyes._

"_Salty it is then." He dragged his finger down from the man's face. The man's expression twisted into one of extreme pain and his mouth parted. Trailing after the demon's finger was a wet, colored line of graspable tears. The man screamed a scream of incredible pain. Pain greater than anything physically possible, the pain of a broken heart and destroyed dreams. The pain of a lonely boy rejected by the world. The pain of a forgotten love, of a rejected love._

_It was the pain of existence._

_And at the end- the man smiled._

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"Sh-Sh-Shizu-chan..Oh..God.."

Shizuo grunted as he pushed up into Izaya. The man's legs were wrapped in a vice grip around Shizuo's waist as the blond throttled his body. He had never experienced such a sensation like this and words couldn't even begin to describe-

"Ah _fuck._"

Shizuo panted from the physical exertion. He hadn't taken his clothes off but instead merely undid the front of his pants. At this point, he wished he had. Now his clothes stuck to him from sweating- both out of sexual heat and the actual temperature of the city's climate. It was grueling but he couldn't find it in him to give a fuck.

Not when Izaya was writhing below him like that, his eyes glazed over, his hair sticking up from Shizuo's aggressive hands. The best part was the noises the man mad. They were the most subtle moans, like he _tried _to keep from being too loud.

His voice was breathless and stuttered every time he tried to speak, but it didn't make Shizuo's name sound any less incredible.

How had they come to this? Well….Shizuo didn't even know. They had been walking back from the sky scraper when Shizuo had looked at Izaya. Izaya hadn't been doing _anything _really to warrant Shizuo's sudden pang of arousal. No, he had been skipping ahead of Shizuo a few feet. A feeling of nostalgia had overtaken Shizuo and he had grabbed the man before he knew what was happening.

The kiss had been nothing short of amazing. It burned Shizuo's mind irreplaceably. Izaya had been surprised, no doubt, but taken it in stride. One thing quickly lead to another and Shizuo had Izaya shirtless and on his back. An animal urge, one might argue, but Shizuo could care less. Why hadn't he done this sooner?

When they finally finished, Shizuo was utterly breathless. He sprawled out on top of Izaya, struggling to catch his breath. Below him, Izaya trembled. That's when Shizuo realized that the poor guy was probably sore. Shizuo hadn't exactly been gentle.

"Sorry," Shizuo mumbled, pulling out of Izaya. As he did so, Izaya's face twisted up into an expression of discomfort, but it was quick to leave, and he merely shrugged.

"Don't be. That was _awesome._"

The compliment made Shizuo swell with pride.

"Really?" he asked, almost too eagerly.

"Don't sound like such a virgin. Yes, you dumbfuck, _really." _

Shizuo didn't take offense. Instead, he smiled stupidly and fell back down on top of Izaya to smother him with a kiss.

"Get- off!"

Izaya pushed his face away with a hand and Shizuo instantly erupted into laughter.

"Jeez, what's with you?" Izaya asked, but there was a subtle grin on his face. Well hey, it was a side of Shizuo he had never seen and admittedly, it was _kind _of cute. In a ridiculously idiotic way.

"Ah..I don't really know.." Shizuo admitted, looking flustered. It was difficult to tell whether or not that was from the sex though. Izaya moved to pull his pants up, but Shizuo swatted his hands away to do it for him. Izaya looked confused. Shizuo had to wonder why.

"Something wrong?"

"Eh nothing really," Izaya said, looking unsure.

"Uh.."

"You're just acting differently."

"…No shit."

"Right. Memory." Izaya's expression relaxed and he offered Shizuo a genuine smile before he grabbed his shirt off of the ground. That's when Shizuo noticed the back of Izaya's arm. He grabbed his wrist and lifted his arm up to examine his elbows. As he thought- they were turn up. Fearing the worst, he pulled Izaya towards him and looked over his shoulder and down at his back.

"Holy shit, why didn't you say anything?" Shizuo demanded in mild horror. It wasn't as bad is it probably could have been but Izaya's back was pretty cut up from their..ah, encounter.

"Nya~! I was having too much fun!" Izaya exclaimed sincerely. Shizuo stared at him, dumbfounded, before Izaya snorted.

"Knock it off, Shizu-chan. I've had a lot worse, and I've gotten a lot worse from _you. _Relax. What else did you expect when you decided to fuck me into pavement?"

That was true. Shizuo scratched the back of his neck awkwardly as Izaya finished getting dressed. When he did, Izaya looked a bit hesitant before he leaned down to button up Shizuo's pants. Shizuo was surprised by the action.

"Now, let's go back. It's about dinner time and if Kida didn't do his dinner rounds again, I'm going to have to beat the crap out of him."

When they got back to the make-shift home, the others were already there. Shinra opened his mouth, about to ask where they had been, when a knowing smirk grew on his face.

There had always been something particular about Shizuo and Izaya's interactions after they fucked. It had never been Shinra's place to say, but they were blatantly more intimate in ways that people simply weren't intimate any more. They would touch without reason, exchange unnecessary glances, and would speak quietly with one another. Like they were connected on an ethereal level that only they would ever understand and appreciate. As a man who still believed in the power of love and romance, Shinra typically looked for these things.

Tonight was no different. As Izaya picked at Kida about the dinner he brought home, Shizuo watched him. He wasn't fully aware that he was doing it. He was admiring Izaya. There was a certain glow to his face that stemmed from the aftermath of their explicit passion. His mouth was still a bit swollen from the destructive kisses exchanged and his hair was a mess.

If no one else was around, Shizuo would have been tempted to take Izaya yet again. Or just…hold him. He wrinkled his nose up and had to sneer at himself. He barely knew Izaya. Yet…Izaya and everyone else claimed that he had existed within this world beforehand.

And there _was _the tattoo. Shizuo was beginning to believe that maybe he really had lost his memory. That maybe...He had suffered from some sort of amnesia. But why had his past life been so vivid if that was the case? If it had all just been a dream…

No, his past life had never once felt like a dream. So what if this…No. _This_ did not feel like a dream either. He didn't want it to be a dream. He wanted the existence of Orihara Izaya to be real. He wanted the passion between them to be real. If this was a dream, Shizuo feared that he would never feel this way ever again.

Izaya must have noticed his stare because he looked directly at him, knowingly smirking, before he looked away again. There was a dull flutter and Shizuo dimly recalled Izaya's conviction about love not existing in this world. Shizuo turned his attention onto the butterfly mural across the walls. How could he be so convinced of that when butterflies still existed?

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"_Trust me." _

_The two words stuck out like blood on snow. _

_The forest was silent around them. Snow fell in heavy drafts, freezing the air and freezing the tension._

_Two men stood a few feet apart. One was a tall youth with pale blond hair and sorrowful red eyes. A thick white scarf was wrapped around his neck and a red ticket was clamped between his teeth. _

_The other man's skin was as pale as the snow around them but instead with a sickly gray coloration underlying what might've otherwise been considered pretty. His own eyes were just as red as his companion's, but his had dark circles below them. His black hair was limp and his general posture appeared indolent. _

_His black hoodie with the red fur trim hung off of his shoulders despite the freezing cold. The blond wanted to push it back up but found that he could not move._

"_Tsukishima," the sickly one said, his voice hoarse._

_The blond responded by taking a step forward. Behind his thin-rimmed glasses, his red eyes began to water._

"_Don't cry for me," his companion replied sympathetically, his mournful face darkened with the idea of departure from the blond. He stepped forward the last few steps and raised his hands. They were invisible under the fabric of his sweater but neither of the two cared. His touch was just the same- gentle and caring as he cupped his hands around either side of the blonde's face._

_The blond had such a pessimistically hopeful face. _

"_I love you forever more."_

_It was a promise._

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A few days had passed. On one particular day, Shizuo awoke to the sound of a falling bomb.

An air raid alarm was screeching somewhere in the city and the windows of their room clattered restlessly as the bombs hurtled towards their location. Or near it. None of them could be sure.

Shizuo moved instinctively over Izaya, pulling the blankets up around them for the sake of protection. He would not let Izaya be crushed if he could help it. The others must've been too shocked to move to the tables to hide below them. No, instead, they all waited.

Maybe if Shizuo had cared, he would've been able to describe the smell of gunpowder. Instead, all he could remember was the expression on Izaya's face. How wide his eyes were and how sincerely _scared _he looked. It was the most human that Shizuo had seen Izaya look since meeting him. Shizuo would forever remember what it felt like to be held onto so tightly- like Shizuo really _could _save Izaya from a bomb. And maybe Shizuo could.

When the earth trembled around them but nothing caved in, only then could they shudder in relief. The bomb had not hit them.

But the smell of fires quickly reached into the room. Surrounded by concrete, they had nothing to worry. It did not stop Shizuo and Izaya from rushing to the window-door. Shizuo was the first to crawl out. On his knees, he helped Izaya out of the window and stood up. The others followed behind but Shizuo was distracted by then.

Before them was a burning Tokyo.

Violent red flames engulfed sky scrapers, tumbling buildings were swallowed up into the heat and burst into the streets. The bomb had just barely missed their building. Broken glass littered the streets, reflecting the licks of flame like starlight over a lake. Only this wasn't even remotely scenic. It was horrifying.

It wasn't the flames though. The fire wasn't what was sickening. It was the bodies that fell in black heaps from the burning buildings. It was the nauseating scent of burning hair, burning flesh that was stronger than the ashes of ruined building. It was the bloodcurdling screams of the burning creatures unfortunate enough to have been in the same area as the bomb. It was the

"Anri!" Mikado's yell snapped Shizuo from his trance of repulsion. He looked over his shoulder to see Mikado holding an unconscious Anri. She must have passed out. Shizuo didn't blame the girl. That's when he felt something warm curl into the base of his palm.

He looked down to see a hand within his own. Attached to that hand was Orihara Izaya.

Izaya was looking directly at him, his eyes as red as the blood that ran through the streets. They didn't have to say a single word before Izaya broke into a run. Shizuo stayed right on his heels and the two ran throughout the city and away from everything. Away from the fire, away from the bombs, away from the shards of glass.

Shizuo didn't know where they were going. Tokyo had become unrecognizable to him and he had stopped trying to recall his old life. As they fled their misery, soldiers dressed in black with red bands around their arms stormed by. They had gas masks and guns that might have once been a promise to protect but now, Shizuo suspected, were instruments of terror.

Somewhere nearby, a woman screamed.

And no one seemed to care.

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Only when they stopped running did the screaming fade into silence.

"Are your feet okay?" Shizuo asked, kneeling in front of Izaya who had collapsed onto a park bench. They had run for literal hours. Well into the night and well into the city until finally they had reached probably the only park left mostly untouched. There was still evidence of the city's decay but there was also trees and grass. And silence.

The black sky glowed red and orange in the distance where the fires still were. But to them, it might as well have been a distant memory.

"Yeah, they're fine," Izaya replied nonchalantly. Shizuo didn't believe him. He picked up one of Izaya's ankles and removed his shoe. His sock was soaked in blood. Shizuo didn't scold him or instantly panic. Instead, he removed the sock and simply tossed it aside. He did the same for the other foot before he worked on removing his vest.

"Don't make yourself useless. Next time, let me carry you."

It was the only lecture Izaya would get. Shizuo stood up and went to the massive fountain nearby. The park felt oddly familiar in more than one way. He stopped in front of the fountain and waited. Soon enough, jets shot water high up into the air for a few seconds before the water crashed back down. He knew this park….

He came back to Izaya with a soaked vest and carefully cleaned up his feet. Luckily, the damage wasn't nearly as bad as one might have predicted. The blood had been a little but smeared a lot. The actual inflictions weren't disastrous though.

"Will the others be okay?"

"Eh? Oh yeah, they'll be fine. They don't actually _need_ me. It was simply wise at the time of the war to stick in groups. Even for someone like me," Izaya admitted, but then looked serious, "_Especially_ for someone like me."

"Why's that?"

"Well, you remember what I said about how I was invested in the multiverse science?"

"Yeah."

"Well that got out into the public. They wanted to point fingers for why the world had gotten fucked up and of course, we were the primary targets. Initially, the government was going to hand us over on a silver platter. But then it was lawfully pointed out that we did absolutely nothing illegal. At least, nothing that the government themselves hadn't sponsored. So they had told us that they wouldn't prosecute us but they wouldn't defend us either. Basically, if we wanted to be safe, we had to make ourselves safe."

Shizuo turned around in front of Izaya and gestured for him to get onto his back. Times like these, it was not safe to stay in one location for long. With Izaya safely on his back, he stood up and began to walk.

"_And_?" Shizuo persisted.

"We were originally together in a group of ten. We thought we would be just fine with our resources and collective intelligence. I knew that Shinra and myself would be all right. We grew up in the city whereas the others had grown up in the country and were raised to be civilized animals. Shinra and I only ever knew how to be wild humans." Izaya seemed to find his own joke funny. He began to chuckle but when Shizuo pointedly shifted him roughly, he got the message to knock it off and keep talking.

"Fine, fine. So it didn't take long for them to be killed off. All of them. It was pretty gruesome, I'll admit, but Shinra and I were okay. Which is all that matters anyway, hn? We came across those three kids- I had already known Kida through one way or another but we decided to stick together. They're pretty young. Shinra said it didn't feel right to leave them on their own. Even though they are perfectly capable…"

"What about that headless chick?"

"Who, Celty?"

"Yeah."

"Ah yes. Her. Shinra's lover."

"He likes a chick without a head…?"

"Weird, isn't it?"

That was one word for it.

"That's a little more..complicated. Celty is a dullahan. Do you know what that is?"

Shizuo shook his head.

"Well, in the Norse folklore…"

"Just give me the short version of it, Izaya."

"But…Fine. Protozoan…She's basically a headless horseman. Or rather horsewoman. Her soul is carefully divided but it was originally with her help that we were able to reach through the multiverses. With her severed head she was able to connect to different parts of herself individually. Thus making us wonder if we too could communicate and connect to separate parts of ourselves. Of course there was the initial debate of whether or not we had other 'selves' but once we got through that…."

"This sounds like something you worked a long time on, eh?"

"…You could say that."

"Still don't get where I come into all of this. How come I crossed into this universe? How come I didn't know a version of you in my other life?"

Izaya's silence wasn't very comforting. Something about Izaya suggested that he was the basis for a hefty amount of information. Much more than most people were capable of withholding their whole lives. The fact that he might not have had the answer didn't thrill Shizuo. At the same time, he knew that he couldn't hold it against the man either.

"A possibility for not having known a version of me could simply be because you crossed the universes before you had the chance to meet me."

That made enough sense.

"But what about me? Why the hell am I even here?"

"You..You had been interested in connecting fully. You wanted to know if two selves could become a united self. I tried to tell you that it was impossible. That it would be the equivalent of having severe split personality disorder but you were so determined..I couldn't stop you."

"Sounds like I was pretty smart!"

"Yeah, in a real stupid kind of way."

"_Hey._"

"…Anyway. You said you'd come back. But if you didn't after three years to come and get you. I knew where you had gone. We had a trick ready to use. Three years passed and I heard nothing of you. So I came to get you."

"But how the hell do you know if the Shizuo you knew is inside of me?"

"Ah that's pretty simple."

"How the fuck is _that _simple?"

"You followed the black rabbit."


	4. Chapter 4

Disclaimer: Durarara! is not mine. Heiwajima Shizuo and Orihara Izaya were not my original creations.

Warning: Story contains violence, sexuality, offensive language, and malexmale relationships.

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"_Is anyone sitting here?"_

_When he looked up, he didn't expect to be looking at that face. The man didn't belong in this bar. Not at this hour, not at a time like this. But Shizuo had been expecting him._

"_No," Shizuo replied even though it was so obvious. The entire bar was empty save for a pathetic soul sulking in the corner over his whiskey. The drawl of Billie Holiday sputtered out of a scratchy record player but other than that the bar was silent._

_The man was handsome in an unconventional way. He was dressed smartly in a carefully bespoke suit that complimented his lithe body. _

"_What would you like?" Shizuo asked, setting down the glass that he had been polishing. The man rested his head into his hand and sighed. He looked so tired, and yet he smiled so sincerely that it made Shizuo's heart skip restlessly. Like an animal caught in a trap._

"_Why don't you try and read my mind?"_

_Shizuo was a bit surprised by the direct tone of insinuation the man used. He was hitting on him. Shizuo looked over at the drunkard in the corner and then back to the daring man._

"_Don't you think it's a little dangerous to speak like that so openly?"_

"_It's not like you're doing much about it. Does that mean you don't mind?"_

_Shizuo didn't respond. But with that, his silence was all the recognition that the man needed. _

"_When do you close up?"_

_Shizuo looked over at the clock hanging above the door._

"_In about twenty minutes."_

"_I'll stick around. Got a name?" _

"_Shizuo, sir."_

"_Sir? Nah. These don't mean much of anything to me," the man said and gestured to the honored badges. Mean nothing? It wasn't often that Shizuo heard war heroes speak like that about their victories. _

"_I need to start putting chairs up," Shizuo said, "Do you want anything first?"_

"_How about just a glass of water?"_

_Shizuo got the water for the man and went to work cleaning up the small bar. The bar was desolate and Shizuo had been surprised that it was still in business- especially during the war. The bars that were successful now were due to the fact that so many women went there. The soldiers wanted women. And the women didn't want to come to this part of town._

"_Excuse me sir, but we're closing now," Shizuo spoke to the drunkard, gently patting his back to get the man to stir. After a moment, he did, slurring something about a daughter. Shizuo helped him to his feet and walked him to the door._

"_Did you walk here?" he asked, opening the door. The man mumbled something and Shizuo sighed. He waited a few moments before he noticed a cab drawing near. He hailed it down and helped the man inside. _

_After the drunkard was off, he returned to the bar and began to pick up the chairs. It didn't take long, but it felt like forever when that soldier was watching him so intently._

"_Do you dance?" the man asked once Shizuo locked the doors._

"_Not really."_

"_Would you like to?"_

"_Sure."_

_Shizuo didn't dance, it was true, but he felt…_

_The man had approached him and it was only then that Shizuo realized how much shorter he was than himself. He took the man to his own body and accepted his arms around his neck. He rested his own hands just above the man's hips. He had been taught to respect others, not to violate them._

"_What's your name?"_

"_Orihara Izaya."_

_They swept slowly and clumsily across the wooden floor. It creaked every now and then under the pressure of their weight but nothing came between them but the filtered scratch of melodic blues. _

"_I feel like I've been here before," Izaya spoke suddenly. _

"_Maybe you have." _

_Izaya dropped his head forward against Shizuo's chest and inhaled._

"_You feel so familiar."_

_Shizuo didn't reply._

"_Did you just come back from the war?"_

"_Yes. I don't think I will be going back."_

"_Why not?"_

"_What type of question is that? No one wants to be at war, Shizu-chan."_

"_Some people are violent by nature."_

_Izaya lifted his head off of Shizuo's chest. He stopped dancing and stared up at the other._

"_Are you?"_

"_Sometimes."_

_Shizuo wasn't going to lie. His temper flared and he lost control. It scared people sometimes but there was nothing that he could do about that. He worked in a safe setting. It was so uncommon for anything dramatic to happen at the lowly bar. _

"_Have you ever danced with a man before?" Izaya asked. The question went deeper than that. Even Shizuo knew that. Shizuo removed himself from Izaya but didn't step away from him. He put a hand into his pocket and with his other took out a cigarette._

_After he lit up, he answered._

"_Once."_

"_What was he like?"_

_Shizuo inhaled deeply and removed the cigarette from his mouth._

"_He was you."_

_Izaya blinked at Shizuo. Shizuo looked down at him and brought his free hand up to the side of Izaya's head. His fingers pushed through his hair and against his scalp until he felt the hardness of a metal plate beneath the skin._

_The damage was irreversible, but every evening Izaya came to the bar looking for Shizuo without realizing it. It was easier when Shizuo played along._

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"I didn't think that diners would still be in service during a war."

"People still have to eat."

The diner was rustic and Western in style. It looked like it came straight from a cinematic action film where the protagonists met with a mysterious suitcase. As they were seated by a middle-aged woman, Izaya put in an order for coffee.

"Would you like some too?" the woman asked Shizuo, who politely rejected and asked for a glass of water instead.

As she walked away, Izaya focused his attention on Shizuo. Outside, the warped sky was lit up with occasional bombing. It was like watching fireworks. The occasional echo boom of an exploding bomb made the windows of the diner tremble, but they were safe. For now.

"How did this war start anyway?" Shizuo asked.

"The city divided itself. From there on, the rest of the world followed. It doesn't matter anymore. Japanese are killing Japanese, Americans are killing Americans, Russians are killing Russians. Everyone is fighting. It's the division of opinion."

"But since when the hell has that mattered?"

"Shizu-chan, you must be kidding me. Since when has war not been about a matter of differing opinions?"

Their beverages came. Shizuo didn't drink his water but Izaya start to drink the coffee black. Izaya looked exhausted and if Shizuo wasn't so adverse to bitter things, he might have gotten a coffee as well. They had been running for a while now. The bombs were far behind them but it was as if the shock wasn't yet gone. Would they ever go back? Shizuo wasn't sure but that wasn't important right now.

"What about the numbers tattooed on our skin?"

"You have to identify the sheep someway before taking them to slaughter, don't you?" Izaya's grin was unsettling.

"That reminds me- why exactly was I charged for murder? Did they just give up on chasing me?"

"Probably for now, yeah. They have better things to do than worry about one killer when they have a whole city in destruction. Seems kind of funny that people can still find the time to complain about something like that anyway," Izaya mused, setting his coffee back down onto the table.

"And the murder? I don't remember but.."

"Before you left, you were a…I don't really know how to tell you," Izaya said, and he sounded far too amused for Shizuo's liking. Especially since the news he was about to receive probably wasn't _great._

"Eh? Just spit it out."

"You were somewhat of an assassin."

"_What?_"

"I had a feeling you would respond like that. It was pretty interesting actually. I was a scientist still when I first met you. You had a target on Shinra's head for his withholding of a dullahan that the yakuza wanted. Oh, you didn't work for the yakuza. You worked for whoever paid you. We hated each other pretty much from the start."

Shizuo took the information in slowly. He knew that Izaya wasn't lying to him. He looked too satisfied for that. But had he really killed people? Willingly? Just because he was paid?

"I can see that you're shocked."

"Shut it. I never once wanted to hurt people…!"

"Yeah well in _this _world, you didn't want to be jerked around by society's leash either. You didn't want to be the animal they liked to aggravate with a stick. You had a lot of respect here. No one fucked with you."

"Really…?"

"Sure. They knew you wouldn't think twice about murdering them. I admired your malice. It was attractive."

"There is nothing attractive about that."

"There isn't? Are you sure about that?" Izaya asked and looked pointedly at Shizuo. The blond looked out the window. He knew what Izaya was getting at and he knew he was right. Izaya was a malicious creature. He reeked like sin and Shizuo was attracted to him like vultures to a carcass. It wasn't as though he wanted to think about it in that way.

"How come I forgot about all this? How come.."

"You really have a lot of questions. Not that I _really_ blame you. Well, you wanted to fuse yourself with another of yourself. There was a possibility of memory loss. One of the personalities would take the reign of the new body and swallow up the other. You obviously still have some of the Shizu-chan that I know. Or else you wouldn't have _ravished _me so thoroughly." Izaya smirked.

"Don't say stuff like that in public! Shit…" Shizuo glanced this way, that way, like he expected someone to jump on them for their explicit relationship. But of course- no one seemed to notice.

"Oh, who's listening? I wasn't aware that we had a crowd," Izaya said and dramatically stood up from the booth to peer around the diner as well. Shizuo reached across the boot hand yanked him back down.

"Knock it off!"

"Shizu-chan is so serious~!"

"Shut up!"

Izaya's laughter filled the mostly empty diner and Shizuo gritted his teeth. He hadn't felt the urge to rip out the nearest object in a really long time.

"I get why we hated each other."

Izaya's laughter came to a sudden halt and he looked somewhat proud.

"Yes. I hated you with my entire heart."

"You're saying that like it's a good thing."

"Isn't it?"

"Fuck no. I don't get this- I don't get our supposed relationship. It's messed up."

"Really?" Izaya's question was genuine. He tapped his chin and stared at Shizuo for a long moment.

"Well, it makes sense in a way. I know you're stuck up over that whole love thing but..well. Isn't hating someone a lot more promising than loving them?"

"The hell? How does that work?" Shizuo asked, finally taking a sip of his water. He needed to distract himself and there had been 'No Smoking' signs outside of the diner. As if a little tar and nicotine would hurt anyone during a war like this…Bastards.

"Hn, well, if you love someone, you'll probably stop one day. Or it will fade. But when you hate someone, it takes a lot to get you to stop hating them. You usually hate them pretty much forever until the day one of you dies. You hate with your whole heart and you always hate them just as much as you did yesterday. Sometimes, you even manage to hate them a little more. When you look at it, isn't hating someone a lot more romantic than love ever could hope to be?"

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"_I am going to show you a series of cards. Each card has an ink blotch on it. I want you to tell me what you see. All right, Shizu-kun?"_

_The boy did not respond. _

_Dr. Kishitani smiled nonetheless and began the Rorschach test. The first card was revealed and Shizuo stared listlessly at it. It looked like an ink block. He didn't know what the doctor wanted him to say. _

"_I want to go home."_

"_Naturally."_

_The doctor set down the cards. They wouldn't get anywhere today with them. It wasn't like they were significant to Shizuo's diagnosis anyway._

"_Can you tell me about your friend?"_

_Shizuo stared at him but didn't respond._

"_Hm? What was his name again?"_

_No progress was made that day and the teenager was sent back to his room. At the age of seventeen, he had been diagnosed with split personality. What no one seemed to understand was that Shizuo was _not_ mentally deranged. There was only one person who seemed to understand precisely what he was going through._

_That same person was sitting on his bed when he got back to the group's bunk room. Orihara Izaya._

"_Hi, Shizu-chan."_

_Shizuo smiled. Whereas the doctors of the clinic did not care to listen to him, Izaya did. Izaya had told Shizuo on day one that he had been fascinated by psychology at a young age. It was on a different level though. He was interested in alternate personalities. Which was one of the reasons that he was so invested in Shizuo. _

_Shizuo had begun to feel a connection to someone outside of himself when he was sixteen. It wasn't until this past year that he actually saw the solid person of who he had felt so drawn to all of this time. It had been himself but not quite himself. The other boy he saw reflected him identically in looks except for his blue eyes as opposed to Shizuo's amber. The boy had been dressed in a traditional kimono and told Shizuo to call him Tsugaru. _

_When he had met Izaya, he had been withdrawn from him. It wasn't until he discovered that Izaya had a similar connection that he began to open up. _

"_I can see them too," Izaya announced one evening, "I think they call to us from another universe. I think there is more."_

"_More? More what?"_

"_More selves. That's what Psyche said. He told me that the universe he comes from is invested into this sort of science. He says that he is considered to be a program rather than a human. Could you imagine that? Being considered a program when you have a heart beat?"_

"_Isn't that what we're considered here? In this place- right now?" Shizuo had asked._

_Izaya had smiled at him._

"_Exactly."_

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"This should be safe for tonight. We used to come here sometimes when we wanted to get away," Izaya explained. The apartment was run down and had an unpleasant stench that came from the sewage pipes out back. Shizuo followed after Izaya into the darkness of the two-room apartment until they reached a mattress.

"Is there a point to all of this?" Shizuo asked, walking to the window. He wrenched a plank of wood that had been nailed over the window and peered out. The bombs had finally stopped falling.

"To what?"

Shizuo didn't respond. Instead, he walked to the bed where Izaya had sat down on and kneeled in front of him.

"Where are we going?"

"Why are you asking me?"

"Because you're the rabbit here."

Izaya leered at him.

"You've gotten smart," he acknowledged. Shizuo shifted forward and leaned up to catch Izaya's mouth in a hearty kiss.

Was hate really so much better than love? What about the butterflies….The butterflies!

"Izaya, who had painted those butterflies all over the walls back in the building?"

"Eh?"

"You know, the butterflies?"

Izaya looked up at the ceiling and his expression took on a look of thought. When he seemed to remember, he shrugged indifferently and pushed Shizuo away.

"We did."

"Eh?"

"When we were kids."

"But I thought you said we met when we were adults. Or at least implied as much- since you said you were a scientist and that I was-."

"I did. But that's the thing."

Shizuo watched as Izaya stood up and removed his jacket to set it over a wooden chair that was just beside the bed. He turned back around and stared at Shizuo with unwavering eyes.

"Don't you get it yet? We managed to slit a throat in the universe and the blood came rushing out before anyone knew how to stop it. When we sent you through the worlds and into another, it let other universes start to interact. When people found out…It was maddening. The idea of other worlds, of alternate existences..People couldn't contain that information in a comprehensive manner. People weren't ready to accept something that was so beyond their understanding that they began to rip themselves apart. Some people wanted to enclose the universes and forget that this ever happened. Others wanted to explore more. Some wanted to exploit it and investigate the other worlds. Then you had the politicians who wanted to get to the other universes for the sake of resources and currency."

Izaya snorted.

"Why would you waste such a magnificent experience for something as stupid and trivial as wealth?"

"That's why we're fighting? But that's so stupid."

"Is it, Shizu-chan? This is the most colossal discovery any single human has ever made. No discovery will ever be as great as this…Unless of course, someone discovers God in the flesh."

"What about the kids-."

"Ah yeah. At some point…Isn't it funny, but in another universe, we know one another as children. Two stupidly brilliant children who managed to cross paths of the universes and winded up in ours. We couldn't believe it at first but there was that undeniable connection and..." Izaya shook his head. He covered his face and tried to suppress a smile.

"They were so obsessed with each other. They were just like us, Shizu-chan. They painted butterflies all over the walls all of the time. They said that they were so full of butterflies that they didn't know where to put them so that they had to put them _somewhere._"

Shizuo couldn't help but detect a certain melancholy tone to Izaya's voice. What was wrong? He stood up from where he had been kneeling and walked to Izaya. He stood in front of him but said nothing. Apparently he didn't need to.

"They died."

Shizuo gapped at him. _Died?_

"But how?"

Izaya shrugged and placed his palm directly over Shizuo's chest. His dark eyes showed unmasked sorrow. That was when it hit Shizuo. This man had been through so much. This man had the weight of _so much_ devastatingly drastic information that he might as well have been insane. The things that he had _seen_, the losses, the war, the things he had _experienced._..

"_You_ killed them," Izaya stated.

The information shocked Shizuo into cold blood.

"The murder you were charged with was the murder of you and I."

"But why…why would I _do_ that?"

Izaya shrugged and dropped the hand away from Shizuo's chest. He looked up at him and smiled with calm indifference.

"They had been the evidence of the world that the universes were possible to transfer inbetween. After they walked into ours, everyone knew that this was possible. Scientists wanted to sample their blood. At first, it was okay. We let them and it was detected that they had the identical DNA to ours. But then they wanted to do other experiments. Some people wanted to kill the children, or even torture them, because of the idea that their existence in our world was an abomination against nature. All those children wanted to do was paint butterflies. Isn't that funny?"

Shizuo backed away from Izaya. He had killed two children? The information was still sinking in and he was having difficulty registering anything that Izaya was trying to tell him. When he sat down onto the mattress, he felt nothing but the weight of horror. He had never wanted to hurt anyone his whole life, yet he had killed two children? Not just _any_ two children but _Izaya _and _himself_. They might as well have been _their children._

Izaya approached him and kneeled on the mattress behind Shizuo. He rested his palms against Shizuo's shoulders and slowly began to massage the toughened flesh.

"They were technical property of the laboratory that I worked at. Which is under a branch of the government. You were hired to assassinate the children by none other than yourself. We had learned how to cross universes and after you had destroyed them, you wanted to converge yourself with another. You wanted to…protect me."

Shizuo looked over his shoulder at Izaya and sneered. How in the world was killing apart of this man protecting him? What had his old self even been thinking?

"I know, I know. It seems strange. You had a bit of a God complex, Shizu-chan! You thought that if you were connected to all of your souls.."

"But that makes no sense."

"Eh, how is that?"

"Isn't...Wouldn't it be that my soul is the same...It's just stretched out through time and worlds. It is a creation within the realm of existence. It is no different here and it is no different there. My soul is eternally the same and so is yours. That's why…That's why we're…"

"Lovers?"

"I thought you didn't believe in love."

"I don't but my counterparts apparently do."

Shizuo twisted around and stared up at Izaya. Izaya looked back down at him and while there was no graspable love in those eyes, what he saw reflected in them assured him of Izaya's loyalty regardless. Maybe this Izaya could not love him, but the passion of a hundred separate individuals compiled into one soul was enough eternity for Shizuo that he didn't need the direct love when he had all of _that._

"Soul mates," Shizuo suddenly said, the dawning realization of such a silly notion enlightened him with a ridiculous smile. Izaya looked at him before he scoffed.

"I hate that term. It's so childish."

"But it's _true._"

"Shizu-chan, please try and be more creative."

"Uh.."

"Right, sorry. You're a Neanderthal. The extent of your creativity is stick figures on a cave wall."

"Or butterflies."

"Or butterflies. By the way Shizu-chan, I had no clue that you could be so eloquent. Who would have thought that my philosophical ramblings would've rubbed off on you so quickly!"

"I think I'm starting to get this all."

"Are you though?"

When they went to sleep that evening, Shizuo was riddled with thoughts. He didn't understand some things but he was beginning to realize other things. Any sliver of knowledge was better than the ignorance of existence, right? He smirked. Izaya would be so proud of him if he could read his thoughts right now.

All of Shizuo's life, he had been declared to be a_ little_ bit more stupid than some of his fellow classmates. It had never really been that he was _stupid_ though. He was a poor test taker and he didn't know how to phrase what he wanted to say. Naturally, that came off as unintelligent.

The first time he had a crush it was on a history teacher when he was twelve years old. It had been the first time that he had been attracted to anyone and he had liked the man simply because he hadn't treated Shizuo like a complete idiot. The man was married to a wife and nothing had happened but Shizuo never forgot what it felt like to be accepted.

As Izaya slept beside him, he pondered what the Izaya in his own universe would have been like. Shizuo was aging as ever day went by and he had never altered his routine. Would Izaya have been a new co-worker? Would he have appeared similarly as he had in this world- out of the blue?

Shizuo had never had a lover. He had never even really kissed anyone either. He had been aware of himself sexually by this age, no doubt, but he had never understood the concept of flirting and the mechanism of romantic intention. If he had, he would've noticed the way a boy had looked at him when he attended college.

Instead, Shizuo had assumed the worst and just took it that mostly everyone was either afraid of him or looked down on him.

But Izaya…

He turned onto his side and placed a heavy, powerful hand over Izaya's face. His skin was nearly flawless. There was no blemishes of past acne. There was no wrinkles from stress and there wasn't even any bags under his eyes. The face was sculpted to fit an androgyny beauty that was selectively attractive.

Shizuo suddenly felt giddy. He _was _the luckiest man alive in the world.

If Izaya was awake, he wondered fondly if he would have been smacked in the face for thinking such sappy thoughts.

Izaya shifted closer to Shizuo in his sleep and Shizuo naturally placed an arm over the warm body. He dragged him close and caged him in. The war wouldn't get Izaya. Shizuo knew that the man didn't need his protection but Shizuo wanted to offer it to him. He had never needed to use his strength before and he must have been given it for a reason.


	5. Chapter 5

Disclaimer: Durarara! is not mine. Heiwajima Shizuo and Orihara Izaya were not my original creations.

Warning: Story contains violence, sexuality, offensive language, and malexmale relationships.

Once again- thank you so much for the reviews! Ah…and the next chapter _will _be the last. Like I said, this story isn't really supposed to amount to some massive thing or..whatever. I hope the end is somewhat satisfying regardless! If you have any questions..feel free to ask :]

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"_I didn't know that you could play the piano." _

_The statement interrupted what had been a beautiful, melancholy piece. _

"_Pardon me for interrupting." The blond butler entered the room with a silver platter. He approached the piano and set the tray down to pour the tea. The man at the piano did not reply instantly but instead focused on the lapel of his butler's jacket._

"_Shitsuo," the man spoke, "I'm dying, aren't I?"_

"_Perhaps in some world, yes, but as far as I am concerned, that is hardly something worth discussing."_

"_Please be realistic."_

"_Roppi," the butler addressed his master, "I will not tolerate this sort of talk. Please drink your medicine."_

_Roppi stared at the butler through empty, red eyes. He had already died and his butler was in denial. He picked up the tea and began to drink._

"_Shitsuo, why have you stayed on with me after I let you go?"_

"_Because you are my master, sir."_

"_That sounds like a preordained response. I only hired you a few weeks ago."_

"_And you were only diagnosed a few weeks ago. I still have so much to learn about you."_

"_I think this is rather foolish of you."_

_Roppi set the tea cup down and began to play again. It was not Shitsuo's place to care intimately for his master but he could not withhold the urge to reach out to caress the man's paled face. Roppi's hands hesitated over the keys before he turned his attention onto Shitsuo._

"_Would you like to learn how to fly, master?" Shitsuo questioned. _

"_To die would be an awfully big adventure," Roppi quoted._

"_Peter Pan?"_

"_The one and only."_

"_Why Peter Pan?"_

"_Simple. Everything was accepted for exactly as it was told. Questioning was irrelevant because children don't care about the mechanisms of how things work. They just care that things work."_

"_So what does that entail?"_

"_That's easy. That the reasons birds can fly and we can't is simply because they have perfect faith." Roppi quoted yet again._

"_To have faith is to have wings," Shitsuo finished the quote._

"_So if you want to teach me how to fly, you better think of something for me to be faithful in."_

X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X

"A black rabbit huh? Isn't that kinda too Wonderland..y?"

"Maybe a little but that wasn't actually where the image was influenced from," Izaya replied. The day was hot and sticky. Even though the sky was tainted by war, it was evident that the sun's rays still had impact on the earth .Sweat dripped down the back of Shizuo's neck and he was grateful that they had decided to get some ice cream.

They had made their way down to a river and had taken seats on an abandoned bridge. Moss had long ago covered over the wood and the river must've been forgotten because it ran free of pollution. Or it at least looked clean enough to drink out of – not that Shizuo would risk that.

Things didn't always appear as they seemed, after all.

"Then where'd it come from?"

"_Watership Down _by Richard Adams. It's a phenomenal book. Have you ever heard of it?"

"Nope."

"Figured. You never did appreciate literature," Izaya said, "And, by the way, _Alice in Wonderland _had a _white_ rabbit in a _waist coat_."

"Who cares about the details?"

"Everyone."

Shizuo snorted. Like hell if that mattered right now. No one cared about those things in the time of war. Ironically, that was all that Shizuo and Izaya seemed to be able to talk about. The details of their life together. It was as if nothing else mattered. Why? Because what else did they have? There was no value in currency- at least not like there used to be. Having nice things only lead to disappointment when you managed to accidentally lose them or destroy them.

So they had their stories. They had their information. As far as Shizuo was still concerned, Izaya might as well have been a stranger to him. They still had so much to discuss and he still had so much to learn. Everything he learned about Izaya was a refreshing experience.

As the two men sat side by side, a dark form caught Shizuo's attention. It was floating through the water and it wasn't until it passed under the bridge that Shizuo understood exactly what it was. A body. It looked to be one of the soldiers from before. The body was face down and before Shizuo could register any more of the body, it had disappeared under them. Shizuo was glad he hadn't taken a drink from the river.

"What are we running from?" Shizuo asked suddenly. He didn't want to talk about what they had both just seen. Izaya didn't seem to either because he didn't bring it up.

"Everything."

Izaya's focus wasn't on the river. It was on the sky high above. Shizuo followed his gaze. Just then, three war planes flew overhead. A sight that was becoming familiar with the passing days.

"Is that Japan's army firing attacks on its own people?"

"They think it will control the wars in the cities. They don't realize that it's too late. And besides, everyone's already been taken over by war's savage nature. It wouldn't matter how many arrests they made or how many bombs they set off. It doesn't matter. In war, everyone is against everyone else. Lovers against lovers, neighbors against neighbors, parents against children…" Izaya shrugged indifferently. What did he have to worry about? It was times like these that it was the wisest to stick with _one _person and one person alone. Shizuo would be that one person for Izaya.

Shizuo finished his ice cream and dropped the stick into the water. If there had been a dead body, probably full of bullets, then what was one wooden stick? He lay back against the bridge and let his body swelter in the disgusting heat.

"There was a black rabbit in _Watership Down _called The Black Rabbit of Inlé. He was their grim reaper- the rabbits' grim reaper-."

"Wait so this book is about rabbits?"

"Didn't I say that?"

"No."

"Oh..Well, it is. It's from the perspective of rabbits. It's about how they must relocate to a new home. It's about their life, their fears, and their culture as rabbits."

"Huh…"

"And Inlé was the rabbit that would come to greet those who passed on. Like a grim reaper but not as creepy. Well maybe a little. He was supposed to be black with red eyes. He was sort of supposed to represent a shadow I guess, or at least that's what I've always gathered. His name was supposed to mean 'moon' or 'darkness' rather."

Shizuo didn't particularly care about a book about rabbits. He wouldn't have bothered to listen on a normal day but this was Izaya. Suddenly, he cared. He didn't know why but he cared about rabbits and what their death god was like. All because Izaya cared.

And Izaya thought that love was abolished from this world?

What a joke.

But was that really what love was anyway? An interest in someone else's interests? Shizuo had to roll his eyes inwardly. It sounded like a crock full of shit but he really didn't know any better. It wasn't as though he had ever liked anyone before. He had never had a boyfriend. Hell, he had never even had a girlfriend during high school or middle school.

Now he was sitting on a bridge in a world at war with itself and talking to a demon of a human about rabbits. It was funny how things took a change for the…best?

"Shizu-chan, are you even _listening?_" Izaya was suddenly above him. His eyes complimented the bloodlust red of the sky behind him.

"Ah no, sorry."

"You can't just ask me a question and then not pay attention to the answer."

Izaya didn't really seem that bothered by it. Instead, he laid down on top of Shizuo. It was too hot for Izaya to be on top of him like this. It was too much but Shizuo couldn't bring himself to shove him off.

"You had told me, before you left, that when I came to get you to come to you in a specific form of my choosing. Something that you would recognize. You left it up to me because you had said that I was smart enough to figure something out that would catch your eye. What better than a rabbit? It's trademark for its cunning, for running, and for the idea of following into another realm. Like you so eloquently put, Wonderland...y. The rabbit."

"It's the year of the rabbit," Shizuo suddenly exclaimed, the realization dawning on him.

"Yes, it is." Izaya sounded pleased that Shizuo had picked up on it that quickly.

"Gracious, kind, sensitive, soft-spoken, elegant, reserved…" Shizuo began to list off the trademarks of a person born within the year of the rabbit.

"Cautious, artistic, talented, shy, compassionate, but one can be moody, dethatched, stubborn, and superficial."

"Was that intentional? Did you intentionally plan to retrieve me the year of the rabbit?"

"Yes. That's what you wanted. You had said that Tsugaru was created for the existence of the year of the rabbit. That it would be the proper time when your souls could align and shift through worlds. That it would become possible then for me to get you because..Well, you had the silly notion of the Red String of Fate-."

"The Red String?" Shizuo's attention was grabbed now and he had sat up, causing Izaya to sit up as well.

"You know of it?"

"Who doesn't?"

The Red String was supposedly a red string attached between two souls. It was said that the two souls attached by the string were destined to wed and be lovers. That the string was indestructible, though capable of being twisted, knotted, and stretched through time no matter how much but that it would never give.

It was a pretty romantic thing for someone who didn't believe in love to say. Then again, Izaya hadn't said directly that _he _believed it. Rather Shizuo's old self.

"He figured that I would be able to get you back. So everything just matched..After everything, after every thought and hint, why should I have been anything but a rabbit?"

X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X

"_Leave him alone!"_

_Most children would have recognized that voice in a heartbeat. These children, however, were from the public school and knew nothing of Heiwajima Shizuo. Sure, they had heard the rumors of a monster boy with tremendous strength but to them- those stories were mere urban legends._

"_Why don't you go play hero somewhere else, eh?" one of the bullies sneered. There were three of them, each one uglier than the next, and they were standing over a huddled boy._

_One huddled boy that _most _people knew better than to mess with._

_The reason why stood a few feet away from the bullying, panting wildly with a stop sign grasped in one tiny, powerful fist._

_It was the first thing the bully noticed when he had turned to tell the other kid off._

"_What the…"_

"_Holy shit-!"_

_The bullies broke apart like wild animals but it was too late. Shizuo had already seen the damage they had inflicted upon his friend and he would not stand for that abuse. Not if he could help it. _

_With a scream of a war hero, Shizuo swept his sign through the air- throttling one of the bullies' dead on. The bully went through the air and landed in a motionless heap a few feet away._

_By then, the other two had run off. Shizuo's small body trembled from the effort of swinging the sign. He knew that he was getting stronger but the effort of running after the bullies and grabbing a street sign in turn had been quite exhausting for his ten year old body._

_He dropped the sign, his hand scraped from the torn metal, and approached the boy he had vowed to protect with all of his might._

_Orihara Izaya._

"_Shizu-chan," the boy mumbled once Shizuo had squatted down in front of him. He didn't look too beat up. Izaya sat up slowly, and that's when Shizuo saw a fresh black eye._

"_Those bastards!" Shizuo yelled, his face scrunched up in fury as he stood back up- by Izaya reached out to grab his wrist._

"_Don't worry about it. You scared them off anyway."_

_Shizuo ground his teeth together before he sat back down with a huff._

"_I'm gonna kill them, I swear I'm gonna kill them.." Shizuo muttered, a hand out on top of Izaya's head. Izaya merely grinned and grabbed a hold of his wrist._

"_I can take care of myself, you know," the red-eyed boy calmly reminded his simmering counterpart._

"_Yeah but…"_

"_Shizuo," Izaya interrupted, his gaze serious. It caught Shizuo off guard. But what caught him more off guard was the small peck he received on his cheek. _

_Like a Christmas tree, his entire face lit up._

"_Izaya..?"_

_Izaya snickered and stood up. He offered one of his hands to the other boy, who instantly took it._

"_I don't get it," Shizuo said, rubbing his hand over his flushed cheek._

"_Eh, get what?" Izaya asked, releasing Shizuo's hand in favor of sliding both of his small hands into the pockets of the sweater he wore._

"_Why you're not afraid of me- I mean.."_

"_Shizu-chan protects me, doesn't he?"_

"_Well yeah but.."_

"_Then Shizu-chan doesn't scare me. Besides, even if you didn't protect me…I think you're interesting!"_

"_Eh…interesting?"_

"_Yeah..And cute!"_

_Shizuo's face flushed hotly all over again and he grumbled something under his breath._

"_What was that Shizu-chan?"_

"_I said knock it off. You're embarrassing me."_

"_Nya~! But Shizu-chan…" Izaya prompted but fell quiet, a content smile across his face._

"_Does Shizu-chan like me too?"_

"_Shut up."_

"_It's okay if you do! Let's go get some ice cream!"_

_Izaya didn't wait for Shizuo to answer. Instead, he grabbed a hold of his hands and started to run through the streets of Ikebukuro. It didn't take long for the two boys to find a vendor that was selling ice cream. With the allowance that Izaya had saved up, he bought them both a cone of ice cream._

_As the boys walked, a drop of rain hit Shizuo square in the forehead. Shizuo turned his head up and stared at the gray sky._

"_It's going to rain," he acknowledged. Izaya said something in agreement before another few dozen rain drops fell. They were the big, fat kind that slapped hard but felt warm._

"_Aw no!" Izaya said, and Shizuo looked to Izaya's cone. The rain had started to pelt it away._

"_Ah hurry, c'mon!" Shizuo said, grabbing Izaya's wrist. The two fled from the sidewalk and through the sudden downpour. They just barely made it below a low hanging roof outside of a restaurant. _

"_That was close!" Izaya exclaimed, patting his hair free of water, "I think I have an umbrella somewhere, hold on."_

_As Izaya kneeled down to poke around his backpack, Shizuo watched the city of Ikebukuro darken from the storm. People rushed about under large umbrellas, animals took shelter where they could ,but everything seemed as it normally did for the most part. This city had so many interchangeable qualities that Shizuo couldn't help but be comforted by the familiarities of it all._

"_Ahah!" Izaya said and stood up. He opened up a bright, red umbrella and swung it over their heads. He slipped his backpack back on and stood closer to Shizuo._

"_Ready?"_

"_Sure..."_

_This was pretty romantic. No. Wait no it wasn't. Izaya was just a friend- honestly. He was just…a friend._

_Shizuo's cheeks flushed harder when Izaya suddenly linked their arms. When they stepped out from under their temporary shelter, rain pelted the top of the umbrella, encasing them in this cage of moisture and noise._

"_Oi, where are we going?" Shizuo asked, struggling to feign disinterest in how close Izaya was to him. He didn't care- really he didn't…_

"_I didn't think that far ahead. Want to come over to my house?"_

"_Okay."_

_Shizuo had been to Izaya's home a few times. It was a lot nicer than his own but he had known that because Izaya's father was a lawyer. A really good one too, apparently, or at least that's what his mother had told him a while ago._

_By the time they got to the Orihara household, both of the boys had finished their ice cream cones. As they stepped onto the porch, Izaya folded his umbrella back up and shook it out. The door opened before either of the boys had reached it._

_In the threshold stood Izaya's mother. She had had Izaya at a young age, leaving her face wrinkle-free and still fresh, pretty, and feminine. Her hair was kept long but it was always her eyes that reminded Shizuo most of Izaya._

"_Shizu-kun, I'm so glad to see you. Did you boys get caught in the weather?" she asked, peering out over their heads and at the storm._

"_Uh huh. But I had my umbrella with me."_

"_Good boy. See, what did I tell you…?"_

"_I know, I know! Mom, can we go into the basement?" Izaya asked, briefly exchanging a loose hug around his mother's waist before he walked past her. Shizuo gave her a polite, but flustered bow before he scurried after Izaya._

"_Sure. Dinner will be at seven- Shizu-kun, would you like to stay?"_

"_Okay, yeah..I'll call my mom.."_

"_I can do that for you. Be careful, you two."_

_As they curved around the hallway, Izaya lead Shizuo to a small door that he had never noticed before. He had been to Izaya's house plenty of times before but he couldn't recall going into his basement ever. _

_The steps creaked under each boys' step and they finally reached the bottom. It wasn't a finished basement. The floor was concrete as were the walls. Support rafters and beams were everywhere but they were spotless- like someone bothered to make sure that the basement looked presentable at all times._

_Despite the lack of renovation, there were plenty of things down in the basement. It wasn't a storage area but an entertainment area. An old couch was set up in front of a big television set and a few toys were scattered here and there._

"_Oh um sorry," Izaya said, bending over to quickly pick up a few of said toys to toss them into a bin nearby. The boy reached up to grab a long string of metal beads that were connected to a single light bulb. Giving it a tug, the light flooded the basement dimly._

"_There we go! C'mere, I want to show you my secret hide-out. But."_

"_But?"_

"_But you have to promise to never tell anyone about it."_

_Shizuo had never kept a secret before. He felt excited that someone trusted him._

"_Never!" he vowed passionately, much to Izaya's childish delight._

"_Kay- good!"_

_He grabbed Shizuo's hand and the two were off yet again. They passed a room that had a thundering noise coming from it and initially, Shizuo felt anxious. Until he realized that it was probably just a laundry room or something. Maybe the furnace. _

_Izaya leads him to what appears to be a hole in the wall. A dark red blanket has been nailed in place over the hole in act of a door. Izaya knelt down and crawled through the blanket. Shizuo followed._

_The little room was obviously constructed to be there. For what, Shizuo wasn't exactly sure. Shizuo wondered if maybe Izaya had asked his parents for the room but would they really do that?_

_It's not a huge room. It's roughly the size of an average bathroom but the ceiling is so low that they have no other choice but to kneel. Izaya fiddles around with something but eventually plugs in a chain of miniature paper lanterns that have been pinned along the entire ceiling._

"_Wow," Shizuo mumbled, awed by the sight. On the concrete walls of the small room were large, blue butterflies. Painted sloppily by children's hands, by what Shizuo could only assume as Izaya's hands._

"_Butterflies?" he asked._

"_Uh huh."_

"_Why butterflies?" Shizuo asked, and looked at the boy. He wasn't making fun of Izaya. He was genuinely curious. Izaya crawled over to one of the faded paintings and placed his palm over one of the large, blue wings._

"_I don't..know if I can explain it..." Izaya said, his attention focused so intently on the butterfly that Shizuo had the opportunity to admire Izaya's profile. He had never really found anyone in his class cute or anything before. Izaya was different though._

_They had met one day when Izaya had been a new kid at the school. Unaware of Shizuo's reputation, he walked right on up to say hello and introduced himself. Shizuo had thought that Izaya had ill intentions and threw a desk at the boy's head._

_After that, Izaya continued to talk to him. At first, Shizuo found him relentlessly annoying. He hated his voice, his optimistic and ever-present smile, his stupid eyes…_

_Until of course, Shizuo realized how much he actually _liked _Izaya._

_He liked how he dressed and he liked how he combed his hair while other boys let it grow unruly and messy. He liked that Izaya was so much smarter than the other kids and he liked most of all that Izaya was fearless._

_Izaya was bullied because he _was _kind of weird. He was too nice, almost, and too cheerful. He had a bit of flamboyancy about him that caused boys to call him girlish and other cruel things and pelt him with insults and physical blows._

_The first time that Shizuo had seen this happened, he had really lost it. Desks were flown everywhere and he had seriously hurt one of the boys. He had thought he would lose Izaya because it really had been pretty scary._

_Instead, Izaya had just smiled at him. And said: "Shizu-chan, you're my hero, aren't you?"_

_Hero? Shizuo had never been called a hero before. It had made him swell with pride and from that day forth, he had vowed to never let anyone hurt Izaya ever again. Of course, he wasn't always that punctual but he always served justice in due time._

_But it wasn't because Izaya had called him a hero that he pursued helping the other. It was because…Well. Izaya was right. He liked him. He liked him so much that sometimes it really hurt because Shizuo just didn't know how to handle something like that._

_However, he didn't want to lose in front of Izaya. Shizuo couldn't lose in front of someone he loved. He couldn't lose in front of Izaya. He couldn't let the one he loved get hurt- not when he was given this incredible strength. He had to use it for some good, right? _

"_Shizu-chan, why are you staring at me?" Izaya's voice snapped him from his own head. Shizuo blinked and then blushed hotly. When had Izaya gotten so close to him? _

"_I..I.." His voice failed him and he looked down._

"_Shizu-chan," Izaya said._

_Shizuo looked back up and they were so close that he instantly bumped noses with Izaya. Shizuo fell backwards onto his butt and covered his face with one hand, cheeks raging red. Izaya, on the other hand, giggled and crawled across the concrete floor until he was over Shizuo._

"_W-what…are you…" Shizuo began, lowering his hand. Izaya kneeled between his legs harmlessly and leaned forward._

"_Can I kiss you?" _

_The question stunned Shizuo into silence. Izaya took that as a yes. When they kissed, Shizuo could've sworn that he saw the wings of the butterflies on the wall flutter. _

X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X

Shizuo had come to the conclusion that war wasn't so bad once you learned how to ignore it. It seemed as though the people who survived the most efficiently did just that. It was a tension tone in the background that you either had to dive into to avoid insanity- or plug your ears from and ignore.

Shizuo and Izaya had grown fairly accustomed to that later option. There wasn't a lack of food. There wasn't a huge lack of clean water. Things felt more expensive but theft was always an option and Izaya had made it clear to Shizuo that it shouldn't be something to hesitate over.

"Those diners- they're pretty rare. Those people deserve our money because they bother being civilized. Some people don't forget their manners during war," Izaya had said.

As the city faded into the background of their minds, it did as well in reality with each step they took further into the country. It wasn't necessarily safer than the city, but it was safe enough that it was worth the trip.

"I hear some of the fishing towns are better off," Izaya said as they walked through a particularly wooded area. A man-made path leads them somewhere but neither bothered to care where exactly.

The path turns but both stop instantly at the sight that is revealed through the trees. Beyond the edge of the forest is a vast field. The grass was wild and high, but that was not what had captivated the men's attention. Instead, it was the creatures grazing in the field.

Horses.

Horses of all shapes and colors were dotted here and there. It was evident that they had broken free from their homes. Some had harnesses around their heads while others did not. That and Shizuo knew that there weren't that many horse farms in the area.

…..

Wait.

He _knew?_

He covered his face with one hand and took in a steady breath.

"Shizu-chan," Izaya said in a quick, concerned tone.

"Sorry I just…"

"Déjà-vu?"

"Ah-ah…How did you know?"

"Intuition…" Izaya stated simply. He removed Shizuo's hand from his own face and placed a hesitant kiss on the tip of each finger. His eyes were focused on Shizuo's face. The blond man didn't expect the other to be so openly affectionate nor gentle with him.

"Izaya?"

Izaya seemed to break from his transfixion and then looked guilty.

"Sorry- I just..for a moment…"

"I looked like the other Shizuo."

"What? That's ridiculous. You look alike."

"Sure but..we don't always _look _alike, right? I mean, there's those subtle differences that come with the personality, right?"

"…."

"It's okay to miss him." Although Shizuo couldn't help but feel a little hurt that he couldn't properly replace his other self within Izaya's life. The thought was selfish though and he quickly abolished it.

Izaya had never once tried to insist that he act the way the other Shizuo had acted. But surely that didn't mean that Izaya hadn't missed him- right?

"Izaya," Shizuo said firmly. The brunette looked up at him, his eyes apologetic but Shizuo didn't want to see that. No. Izaya didn't need to be sorry for something that he could not help.

"I'm not him," Shizuo eventually said, "But I..will do my best to…I will protect you. Okay? I'll protect you from this war. I'll protect you from...from _everything. Anything. _I've..never had a lover before and. I'll do my best. I know I'm not..Smart or...anything. I'm not really talented either- I mean.. I had a dead-end job before..And.."

"Shizu-chan," Izaya silenced him with a finger on his lips. Shizuo looked up at him, his heart strained from the stress of passion. He had never had someone like Izaya before. His heart tangled in his throat the moment he saw the expression on Izaya's face.

Izaya was looking straight at him- and in that moment, Shizuo knew that he was all Izaya saw in this world.

X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X

"_Psyche," a voice said from behind a desk chair. The man in question stood on the other side of the desk. His usually jubilant face was sullen and paled. _

"_This is killing you, isn't it?" When the chair turned around, Orihara Izaya was revealed. His usual, characteristic smirk was not in place though. On his desk beside his several electronics was a clear jar. Inside of said jar was a floating head._

_Psyche couldn't stop staring at it._

"_I don't want to see you anymore if it is." Izaya stood up from behind his desk and walked over to the large windows paneling his penthouse. He stared out over the city he so passionately adored but he couldn't find it in himself to smile._

"_Have you talked to Shizu-san like I've told you to?" Psyche finally asked, his voice stronger than he looked._

"_Psyche," Izaya said, his voice impatient, "I understand what you've tried to tell me but…"_

_Izaya walked away from the window and went to lean against his own desk. He stared over at where the chess board he had so carefully organized sat. In the center of the board, the two kings faced one another._

"_I hate him. I hate that monstrous excuse for a human. It doesn't matter if I tried to talk to him- he wouldn't listen to me for a moment. Let alone _believe _me. That's just the type of protozoan he is. Irrational, unpredictable…And that is why I hate him."_

"_You change your reasons constantly!" Psyche suddenly yelled, spinning on Izaya, much to the informant's surprise._

"_You always say you hate him for one reason and then you change it the next. Your reasons even contradict each other sometimes and haven't you realized by now that you _both _could've killed each other long by now?"_

_Izaya looked away. He knew that. It wasn't something he was keen on discussing though. Shizuo was simply one of his main sources of entertainment but he had a feeling that that excuse wouldn't fly with Psyche._

"_What if we aren't meant to love in this world, Psyche? What if we are only meant to lay together in hate?" Izaya questioned, walking to his chess board. He picked up the white king, _his _white king and curled his fingers over the smooth marble figure._

"_Hate and love..." Psyche started, cupping a hand over his chest. The wires connected into his set of headphones began to glow, "Become synonyms for one another after a certain point, don't they?"_

"_I suppose one could argue that." Izaya wouldn't deny that. He understood very well that the two feelings shared the same coin. He sat the white king back down but knocked the black king over in the same motion._

"_But I don't want him to have check mate quite yet."_

"_So you admit it then?"_

"_Whether I love him or hate him makes no difference to me, Psyche. I'm not interested in relationships. I won't deny that I feel for him unlike any other- whether that be out of hate or love. Regardless of that, even if I were to talk to him, we could never possibly intertwine in this world as you have with Tsugaru."_

_Psyche fell silent and the pink glow faded._

"_Have you no faith in your passion?"_

"_I feel like such a faith in this sort of thing would be as reassuring to a drowning man as a picture of oxygen."_

_Izaya turned away from his chess board and looked over Psyche's head at the sky beyond him through the window._

"_A war is coming, Psyche. That's my first priority. Not that blond monster."_

"_But…"_

"_I want you to return to your own world. You can't leave Tsugaru, now can you?" Izaya asked, his tone now gentle. This was the side of Orihara Izaya that no one ever saw. He reserved it for none other than…well. Himself. Psyche _was _an extension of his own existence and by now, Izaya had accepted that._

_Embraced it, even. Psyche was different than him. He was naïve, childish, caring, sweet, and loving...All in the same, he reflected Izaya on an intellectual level and for that- Izaya respected him. He never let his kind-hearted nature get the better of rationality because through and through, that would always be Izaya's greatest feat._

"_No, I can't." Psyche's determination to return to his lover was evident, and for a moment, Izaya wondered if neglecting a relationship with Shizuo was a bad idea. Would they really share the same passion? The same commitment, loyalty, love, and undying devotion as Psyche and Tsugaru?_

_The idea was laughable but Izaya had seen evidence of it from Psyche. He couldn't reject the younger portrayal of himself. _

"_I'll tell you what," Izaya suddenly said, walking to Psyche. He placed his hands over the familiar headphones and touched their foreheads together._

"_I will try for you."_

_The enlightenment of peace spread throughout Psyche's entire existence and he glowed radiantly in pink. Izaya backed away, knowing what would happen next._

_Psyche started to flake from the dimension, his persona breaking apart into pixels that evaporated into the air, and before Izaya knew it, he was left alone in his home._

X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X

_The heart beat slowly. It was dying. _

_The room was dark. Outside it rained. The windows rattled from the strong winds of the storm. None of it was acknowledged._

"_It was too much, wasn't it? _He _was too much." _

_The surprisingly calm voice came from the man who was well and conscious. He had a handsome face though it was so consumed by sorrow that one might consider the destruction of beauty to be the ultimate tragedy here. His blue eyes were exhausted but despite the circumstances, his ever present optimism remained. Even though it had dulled significantly, it was the one thing he had to hold onto._

_The man was dressed elegantly in a traditional kimono, a pipe in one hand though it was not lit. The only light in the room was pink, coming from the body in front of him. There was no furniture. There did not need to be any furniture. _

_In front of the blond hovered a youthful male dressed entirely in white. Wrapped in a spherical egg around his body were a few hundred pink wires. They all twisted together at some point to lead as one wire back into the white headphones around the boy's ears._

_It was the wires that were glowing. Above the floating body was a pink anatomically correct heart. It was connected to the wires at the other end and that was what appeared to keep the heart beating. Each beat was a staggering arrhythmia. Each unsynchronized thump made the blonde's own heart skip a beat. Every single time the heart hesitated it was one more time that he had to worry about his lover dying._

"_Psyche," the blond spoke into the silence of the room. The heart responded with two extra beats and the blond smiled serenely. It never mattered what frame of mind Psyche was in, he would always hear him. That was the connection they shared. Among all of their counterparts, they were capable of the most intuitive connection._

_It was still unexplained but the blond had always figured it had something to do with the advancement in their society and their genetics. They were not necessarily part robots as much as they were modified and enhanced human beings. Their intelligence was astounding and their spiritual connection was indescribable._

_They did not need to believe in God when they had their own spirits to have faith in._

_Due to that faith, they were granted access to wings. Psyche had always been with him from the day he had been created. They were not born but rather established through a routine and chance set of genetics placed together._

_Psyche had been beautiful. He had noticed the blond instantly._

"_Tsugaru," Psyche had said, his smile so brilliant that it was forever burned in Tsugaru's mind. They were created to co-exist in harmony with one another. Their universe was very partner based. You were born connected to one other by the appropriate coding of souls and rarely did the system error._

_With Tsugaru and Psyche, it definitely had definitely not been an error._

_The problem with their universe was their ability to connect to the other worlds. The connection was powerful and beneficial but it could take a serious token on those doing the connecting. Psyche had been thoroughly invested in the base soul of his foundation. He had left their universe every other week to try and reach his other selves. One in particular that he had been obsessed with._

_Orihara Izaya. An informant broker in the city of Tokyo, residing in Shinjuku. Psyche had been convinced that Izaya could hear him. He had told Tsugaru, enthusiastically, that he would dream of Izaya's memories. Quickly, Psyche began to connect to others as well._

_The first time either Tsugaru or Psyche had made full connection was with innocent children of themselves. They had been placed in a mental institution due to their connection but Psyche and Tsugaru had managed to do something that their entire world struggled to do._

_It was a strain not just on the soul but the body as well. The different worlds had been created for a reason. A soul was such a massive quantity of existence with several hundred components and layers that it could not reside simply within one body._

_Instead, it had to be spread throughout the universes. It had to be shared. The reason that it had never been possible for the selves to connect before was simply because the worlds had not been created for that purpose. Each self was created to represent that part of the soul._

_To combine the parts would surely kill the soul from the extremity of its own existence. Psyche had been establishing connections with his other selves. It was not that he had combined them but the memories and direct connections were alone enough to be a burden on Psyche._

_He was killing the soul. Certain components were sick. The most recent having been Roppi. Psyche both suffered in guilt and physical devastation of his cellular structure being corrupt with the data of the others of himself. The only hope was for Psyche to be able to reconstruct himself._

_Tsugaru could do nothing but sit by and pray that his lover was strong enough. He was optimistic that it would be all right. He was optimistic that he would continue to hear Psyche's laughter and feel his kisses. Their connection was so strong that if Psyche ceased to live then Tsugaru knew that it was his time as well._

_For Tsugaru's existence without Psyche was fundamentally inconsequential and meaningless. _


	6. Chapter 6

Disclaimer: Durarara! is not mine. Heiwajima Shizuo and Orihara Izaya were not my original creations.

Warning: Story contains violence, sexuality, offensive language, and malexmale relationships.

Sorry about how long this took!

All right, guys, here's the end! I hope you've enjoyed it so far. More importantly- I hope this _feels _like an end rather than just rushed through.

X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X

It was the following day and the rain had started to pick up. Shizuo had learned quickly that there was a difference between storm clouds and the usual red clouds he saw every day. They had to take shelter in an old house in order to avoid the pelting, acidic rain.

Izaya had told Shizuo that the rain wouldn't hurt but it would probably make him sick if they stayed out too long in it. For once, it wasn't a mother's tale but rather the truth. The acid had an adverse effect on the citizens unfortunate enough to be without shelter during storms.

They were drenched but made it inside in time to avoid the worst of the storm. Stripped out of their clothes, it hadn't taken long before Shizuo and Izaya came together yet again. Shizuo was delusional as to where Izaya began and he ended. By the end of it, the taste of Izaya was all he knew and the smell of him engulfed his senses so entirely that the muggy scent of the rain was forgotten.

He held Izaya's body against his own after their moment of spontaneous passion and felt Izaya's body rise and fall in sync with his own. Their bodies were slicked now with sweat rather than rain and Shizuo no longer felt so cold from the bite of the storm.

Thunder boomed nearby, altering them of how close lightening had struck. Shizuo had moved a dresser over in front of the door so that they wouldn't be interrupted. Not that the chances were likely this far out of the city but it wasn't worth the risk.

When Shizuo's breath finally relaxed into a calm pattern, he heard Izaya's heartbeat. Or rather, he felt it. It bumped against his chest through Izaya's back. It was as frantic as a wild animal and Shizuo had to wonder why.

"Are you scared?"

Izaya didn't reply. Instead, he rolled away from Shizuo and lay on his back just beside the blond. Shizuo remained where he was and didn't reach out to touch the other man.

"Sometimes."

Shizuo frowned and tried to peg Izaya as the type who was frightened. He couldn't see it. Izaya always seemed so sure of himself and so confident in everything he did. Fear seemed absent in his life. It seemed like it would be a myth.

He told this to Izaya.

"Shizu-chan," Izaya said after he had laughed.

He turned over onto his side and stared intently at Shizuo. The floor they were on was carpeted but it smelled rank from years of waterlog and architectural rot.

"Everyone gets scared sometimes."

"I know but…"

"Do you believe in heaven?"

"..What?"

"I asked if you believe in heaven, Shizu-chan. Please make an effort to answer now."

Shizuo rolled over onto his own back and stared at the ceiling. If Izaya wanted an answer, he would try and come up with one as best as he could. Normally, it was Izaya who was talking as much as he could. Shizuo never had much to offer. When he did, it didn't even feel like it was himself who was talking.

He closed his eyes. A heaven?

"That depends I guess."

"On?"

"Well..everything I guess. It isn't just a simple question, you know? There's a lot to it and I can't just give you a straight answer. Of course I would like there to be heaven and just as much, I'd like to go to that heaven. But at the same time, it seems sorta like a fairy tale place like Neverland or something. It seems like something people want to think about so death isn't so scary. I'm not scared to die, I'm scared to forget who I was."

"You're scared to become nothing."

"Something like that, sure. But isn't even nothing _something_?"

"That could be an argued point, yes."

"I mean, people who kill themselves, they gotta believe in something right? Is it that their lives are so painful that they feel they have to escape? Or is it that they think the afterlife is just a lot better? Probably depends on the person but..Heaven. Heaven is really just a fancy word for the afterlife, don't you think?"

Izaya smiled.

"What about hell then?"

"Hell..I never believed in that bullshit. Then again I'm not much of a Christian or anything like that. Shit, I'm not religious at all but I never thought that anyone ended in suffering. It doesn't really matter what you did in your life because at some point, I believe that _every single person _has been a _good _person at least _once _in their life. At least once, Izaya. At least once they held the door for someone, at least once they gave someone a compliment. Even if it wasn't genuine.."

Shizuo didn't know when he had gotten like this. He wondered if it was an influence from Izaya or if it was just the old Shizuo shining through. In speaking of which…

"Hey Izaya, do you miss the old Shizuo? Do you wish I was him already?"

"Eh? No. It isn't like that. It's not about what Shizuo I have, it's just about the fact that I have my Shizuo. You're the same man but you're just different angles of him. And I…" Izaya hesitated, as though he were about to say something, but then he continued, "And I hate him from all angles."

Shizuo knew exactly what Izaya had been about to say. Especially when Izaya began to look uncomfortable.

"It's okay to be in love."

Izaya didn't respond but instead rolled over so that his bare back was yet again to Shizuo. Shizuo scooted across the mattress and pressed up against Izaya from behind. He wrapped an arm around his waist and smiled into the nape of his neck. He didn't need Izaya to answer that verbally. He might as well have answered it verbally from his reaction just now though.

The silence extended between them for countless minutes that sunk into an hour. Maybe more. Shizuo wasn't very concerned with what time it was. He moved a hand over Izaya's chest, his mind filled with different sentiments and ideas. He wondered how long he would remain in this world. He wondered if he ever did return, if he would yet again be alone. He'd rather leap from a building. Once you have something, it makes it that much more difficult to lose it. It sounded like an obvious statement, but Shizuo would pick that over his ignorance of emotion any day. Living without the knowledge of what _this _felt like. No. He'd want these memories over nothing any day- even if it would cause him incredible pain to lose it.

"Shizuo," Izaya spoke suddenly, his words slicing throughout Shizuo's skull and breaking him from his thoughts.

"Eh?"

"The old you, the one that I originally knew, I knew a lot about him. I never knew as much about him as I wanted to. He was my first and only partner and that's all I could really ask for in a world like this. Not so many people are lucky as I am to have their partner be replaced by their counterpart. I mean, that's really unique. It's like he never left at all."

Shizuo responded with silence. He wasn't ever sure if he could live up to the old Shizuo. It worried him sometimes that Izaya wouldn't feel for him as entirely as he had felt for the other Shizuo.

"But. I know that you two aren't completely the same. You look identical minus some expressions but your memories..Those are different. So are you experiences. And..no offense but you're a little bit slower than my Shizu-chan was…But don't take that the wrong way. It's kind of charming." Izaya rolled over onto his back and instead looked up at the ceiling.

"So..I want to know about _you. _What were you like before you came here? I want to know you for _you," _Izaya insisted and turned his head to look directly at Shizuo. The blond was caught off guard by the fierceness of Izaya's stare at first and it was within that that he knew Izaya wanted this relationship to be strong, if not stronger than his old one.

"Oh..I'm really not that interesting. Uh. Or impressive for the matter. I mean I kinda got fired from jobs a lot because I'm not really too bright and it doesn't help that I get angry real easy. People piss me off, y'know? They really do. They irritate me. I was..alone a lot. My brother was busy all of the time and so were my parents. It's okay, it's not like I'd ever hold that against them. They loved me- they just had their own lives."

Shizuo was honestly never too bothered by this. They had always gotten together for family holidays and his parents praised him genuinely when he did well in school. It's not as though he had suffered gross negligence as a child. His brother and him had a very close relationship and he would do anything for Kasuka. And he knew that feeling was mutual between the two of them.

"I uh- you were actually kinda my first kiss. I never really was interested in anyone and I don't think anyone really wanted to deal with me either. At least that I know of. I know some girls thought I was cute or something in high school but..They weren't really my type.."

Izaya cut in with a snort. "Was it because they were lacking certain anatomical features?"

"Huh…? What? Oh. _Tch. _Nah. I've never been that type of a guy. I mean, I don't really give a shit _what _you are. I kinda look more at personality. I mean I'm sure I could be attracted to a girl as much as I could be to a guy but the point is that neither have really ever interested me..Well. Not until you at least."

In the dark, he could see the shape of Izaya's smile. Shizuo bowed his head against his shoulder and ignored the tight flutter in his chest. If he could make Izaya smile like that for the rest of eternity and that is all he lived to do…Shizuo really wouldn't mind that.

"Never met anyone like you. You're really nice to look at firstly but that's kind of obvious that I think that now isn't it? Uh..And you're wicked smart. You talk down to me sometimes but you never_ talk down to me._ Does that make sense?"

"Yeah, mostly."

"I never even had pets. I really..I didn't have a great life. I wasn't really depressed. I was just so blank from the everyday routine life of waking up, going to work, coming home, eating dinner, and going to bed. I think had accepted that I'd never be anything more."

"You should never accept those sort of things, Shizu-chan," Izaya said firmly. He looked over at Shizuo and rose a hand and placed it against the side of Shizuo's face. "You're a complete idiot but you're not that kind of idiot."

"Izaya…"

"I'm serious. People accept the mundane too often and waste away into nothing exceptional. Everyone has the potential to be exceptional. That's the gift we're given with the ability of life. Too many people take it for granted. As long as I live, I won't let _you _do that. I know you're an extraordinary creature and you should know that by now too. Don't be an idiot, Shizu-chan. You're not some experimental chimp that has to accept what's given to him," Izaya said, albeit passionately.

"Hey, you could be a motivational speaker!"

"Shut up. I don't care about other people like I care about you. It disgusts me to see you having lived so apathetically when I know that you can be so much more. Don't talk to me about motivation," Izaya muttered dryly.

"What…Do you really think I could actually be something great?"

"You already are."

"I…."

"You're mine. You're my Shizu-chan and that in and of itself is exceptional. Your soul is an important component to this world..To the universe. It's an important component in my life. So what if you aren't a doctor or some big-shot lawyer? You don't need a successful career to be extraordinary. You just need _one _person and _one _person alone to see you for everything you're worth." Izaya turned yet again onto his side and this time Shizuo didn't cuddle up against him.

Instead, Shizuo lay in the wake of their conversation and thought silently about what Izaya had told him. He covered his own chest with his palm and for a moment, he felt as though he really _could _feel the strings that connected their soul into one unit. He felt as though he really could see the bond they and their counterparts shared.

It was truly beautiful.

"Hey Izaya…"

"..Huh?"

"Do you dream?"

"Sometimes."

"What do you dream about?"

"I don't know..how to explain it. It's snippets-."

"Snippets of me and you?"

There was a long moment of silence in which the only thing between them was Izaya's frantic heart.

"Yes."

Shizuo took a deep, shaking breath. Now he had to ask the one question that had been weighing on his mind.

"Izaya..Do you think..I'm going to have to go back to my world? And leave you..?" he asked, unsure.

"No." Izaya's answer was immediate and confident.

"No?"

"You won't. It's destiny that you're here. You're not here to entertain me. There was an exchange of Shizu-chan's soul and your own because you needed to exist in another universe. You had to leave yours. It was the path of righteousness that had been predestined for you…And within that, for me as well."

"But if there is a me in a universe doesn't that also mean there is a you? If I'm following this counterpart thing right.."

"Yes, that's right."

"Then what about the Izaya in my universe? Won't he be…"

"No. I don't think so…" Izaya sounded hesitant but sure all at the same time. Shizuo waited for him to continue speaking.

"The Izaya..in your universe. I think he has bigger plans. A lot bigger plans. He'll find his own Shizuo in another way."

"What if he's lonely though?"

"I don't think he will be. I think..My other part will have a Shizuo much closer to his heart than he'll ever realize..Until the very end of course."

"Do you mean…"

"Yeah."

X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X

"_He is beautiful," the angel said to the stars. _

_The boy rotated on his axis above the earth before he descended._

_The angel had fallen in love. He went to the earth that day to watch the child be born. As he stood beside the bedside of the child within his mother's arm, he smiled. Two little red eyes stared up at him and the angel reached a hand out so that the child could grab one of his fingers with a tiny fist._

_The mother slept through it all._

_The angel stayed near the child as he grew. He waited with exceptional patience for the child. When the child cried, the angel would collect his tears and sprinkle them like hope into the child's heart. He would not let him suffer. When the child bled, he would kiss the blood away and put it back into the child's eyes to restore the glow of healthy energy._

_The child grew steadily into a smart boy. He was above the others in all of his classes and teachers admired his intelligence. They would give him extra assignments to make up for the ones that did not test him enough and they would praise him to his parents. _

_When the boy evolved into a teenager, the angel stayed particularly close. He knew that teenagers had the tendency to be dangerous and careless and he wanted nothing to happen to this boy. The first time something bad happened, the angel had spread his wings and husked the boy out of the way at the very last moment. It was all a miracle to them though._

_It was only love to the angel._

_The boy, the angel would admit, had problems. He was withdrawn and dethatched from society in a way that had not been choreographed by his parents. He was uninterested in people yet wildly passionate about them. He wanted nothing to do with personal relationships but was fascinated in the mechanisms of how they functioned._

_And the boy never did take on any personal relationships. As the days passed and romance fleeted away from the boy, he felt confusion as to how the world could ignore such a magnificent man. Yet he was silently grateful that he never had to suffer the pain of watching his beloved love another._

_Not every child could be perfect but every child was perfect to at least one person. In the end, wasn't that all that a parent could ask for anyway?_

_The boy was never lonely. The angel would stay near and sit beside him while he waited for a bus or walked with him through the rain when he didn't have an umbrella._

_The angel did not need to make himself known to the boy. The boy understood that he was not alone. The angel could feel his recognition like he could feel the nearness of his heart beat and his life line._

_The angel's existence amounted to the idea of patience and eternity. He was an angel that had been given the gift of a soul mate. Angels were not allowed their soul mates like other creatures though. They had to suffer the pain of ignorance and they had to wait for their counterpart to be released to them after the door of death opened to them._

_The angel did not mind though. He waited day after day for the boy to grow into an older man. He did not make excuses for the boy to be killed but rather protected him. He wanted his counterpart to live his life as entirely as he was capable of. The angel would not take away that gift from him in the act of selfishness._

_He was allowed to see the man every single day. He didn't mind not being acknowledged. Every now and then, very rarely, the man would move his head in such a way that the angel knew that he had been heard. Even if it was the whisper of wind or the creak of a step. The man knew that he was not alone._

_The day came where the man's heart could no longer support itself. It collapsed in on itself and the angel could do nothing but watch as he died. Despite what this meant, the angel felt his own heart ache at the sight of his counterpart in the agony and fear of death._

_The angel gathered the man into his strong arms and radiated from him an orb of glowing white. The soul. In the end, he was this man's grim reaper. He curled his hand carefully around the valuable essence of life and stood up from the shell of a body. _

_He left the body behind to be discovered by a neighboring friend. He left the world behind to rejoin the stars. With him he held the precious soul of his beloved. When he reached the galaxy of the in-between, he released the soul into the atmosphere to compile its physical form._

_What took shape was not what the angel had expected._

_Before him stood the shadowy figure of….a demon._

_The demon's black void of a face smiled at the angel._

_And the demon spoke: "You really are the most perfect creation."_

_The angel fell into the demon's arms and when he cried, he felt the true pain of existence and the demon could only laugh manically. _

"_Don't you get it? Don't you get it!" the demon screamed, his wail screeching through the universes like a colossal rupture._

"_This goes beyond you and this goes beyond me. Do you not understand what we are the divinities of? Before light came the dark, before the good came the immoral and insignificant. I was always one step behind you when I saw you. Before the fire came the water. Don't you get it, angel?"_

_The angel screamed to the demon, his eyes split from the sting of tears. His wings molted at the power of the demon's presence. The angel's devastation was silenced._

"_Your faith gave you wings."_

_The angel tilted his handsome face up to stare into the suddenly expressive face of the usually black demon. Slanted red eyes stared down at him as the two hovered in time itself._

"_Why...Why am I crying?"_

"_Because you love me."_

"_But it hurts so much."_

"_I lived for you. I lived so I could meet you. I lived a thousand years over until I could reach you. We share the same heart. It only makes sense that you would feel those hundred years worth of pain."_

"_Were you alone that whole time- was I really so.."_

"_No. I had you every single one of those years but I never had you so directly. This is all I have waited for. It just took some time."_

_The angel had composed himself, the impact of the demon's pain having faded into but a dull throb. He held himself up and stood before the demon, wings spread. It was then that the angel took into consideration what it was that the demon had been telling him. _

"_We're duality," the angel realized._

"_Exactly."_

X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X

"_Iiiiii-zaaaaaa-yaaaa-kunnnn!" screamed the monster of Ikebukuro. Shortly after the threatening yell came a vending machine that crashed into the pavement. _

"_Shizu-chan, you're getting rusty!" came the cheerful reply of Orihara Izaya. He fled from the impact of another vending machine before he lifted himself up onto a fire exit and ran along the iron platform until he leaped across and onto another building's fire exit._

_Behind him, Heiwajima Shizuo stormed like a raging animal._

"_I'm going to fucking kill you once and for all!" yelled Shizuo, much to the informant's delight._

"_If you can catch me!"_

X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X

"_Did you say right…or left? I'm sorry, Roppi, I just-."_

"_It's okay, Tsuki-kun. Let's see the map again," Roppi said in his patient tone of voice. He stopped and waited for the taller blond to catch up with him. When he did, he took the folded map from him and opened it up. After a scrutinizing stare, he made up his mind._

"_We have to go right."_

"_That's a long walk..Are you sure you're okay to make that?" Tsukishima asked the other. Roppi looked up at him through tired, but happy red eyes._

"_Of course. We'll be late, won't we?" Roppi asked and took Tsukishima by his scarf and began to lead him in the right direction._

X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X

"_Bow down to me, peasant!" the little king screamed. When the blond disobeyed him, the little king rose a hand to strike him. It was stopped by the older man._

"_Now, now, Hibi. You shouldn't hit your lovers."_

"_Hey!" Hibi exclaimed, but he was already blushing. He yanked his hand out of the other's grip and adjusted his golden crown._

"_Now," the taller man said, "Ask more politely."_

_Hibi looked hesitant but finally took a deep breath._

"_Delic, please bow down to me."_

_Delic smiled in turn and put a hand over his chest before he gave his little king the most sincere bow of all time. _

"_Anything for you, my king." _

X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X

_An excited voice burst through the silence of a dark room._

"_Psyche? Psyche!" _

X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X

Shizuo woke with a sudden jolt. His entire body was dripping with sweat and beside him, Izaya was no better. Both men were panting.

The storm had passed over, leaving only harsh wind that sounded oddly like wolves.

It had all happened like a mental rush of sharp images. It was as though someone had connected a film strip into his mind and let it run through in a few moments. When Shizuo raised his hands up to his face, they trembled from the intensity of his dreams.

He looked over at Izaya, who looked just as haunted as he felt. He didn't understand where the urge came from but he took Izaya into his lap and enveloped his arms around him tightly. If he could protect Izaya, he could protect the fragility of their minds.

From what? He didn't exactly know but he had never felt so vulnerable in his life before. He didn't need to ask Izaya to know that he had experienced the same images, to know that he was feeling the same exact emotions as Shizuo felt.

X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X – X

They had not gone back to sleep after that. Instead, they had stayed awake long after and listened to each other breath. Something extraordinary had happened but words could yet be applied to what that had been. They didn't need to put a definition on it though. They did not need to discuss it.

The following morning, after they had dressed, the couple left the house for the next strays and carried on their way to nowhere. They walked endlessly. At some point, Shizuo had asked which way they should take at a fork in the road.

"Are we going anywhere in particular?" Izaya had asked him.

"No."

"Then it doesn't matter."

They took a right.

Around them the world was destroyed but between them, all of them, the world was at peace.


End file.
